Role of Indian Railways in Promotion of Tourism in India: A Case Study of Foreign Tourists

Abstract

Travel has been one of the fastest and ever growing service industries with an enormous potential for further growth in world. The bulk of tourist arrivals are in developed countries but now developing countries are also increasingly sharing in the tourism boom. Tourism has come to play an important role in the socioeconomic development of a country. It is both cause and consequence of economic development. Travel today, is sold like any normal consumer product through retail outlets, wholesalers and even departmental stores of many countries. The reasons for travel too have changed over the span of time. Tourism in India is witnessing widespread growth on the back of increasing inbound tourists by the burgeoning Indian middle class, rising inflow of foreign tourists and successful government campaigns for promoting ‘Incredible India’It is a fact that tourism is an inter-disciplinary subject by nature and each of its aspect is too complex and complicated. Form the Indian railway’s point of view, the significance of the study lies in identifying and highlighting the problem areas in the field of tourism development. It specially aims towards finding answers to problems and shortcomings in the field of infrastructure development, improvement in quantity and quality of basic amenities for foreign tourists and requirement marketing of and publicity for the promotion of tourism.