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D. Gambhir et al.
environmental impact and needs to be monitored, planned and promoted with focus
on SD.
Tourism in India is a growing sector that has being promoted strongly by the
government in recent years. The growth and expansion of tourism in a country also
improves the projection of its soft power and image (Bhonsale 2019). There must
be integrated planning in order to make tourism a part of the sustainable development strategy for any nation, which includes considering tourist potential, awareness
generation, and tapping niche segments, such as heritage tourism, rural tourism,
spiritual tourism, culinary tourism, etc. (Nail et al. 2012).
Religious tourism has been prevalent around the world since ancient times and
has economic as well as cultural importance. It ‘satisfies religious and spiritual needs
as well as related art, cultural and historical and other values’ (Dimitrov 2019). It
has enabled ‘regions to grow, residents to raise living standards and social ties in
communities’ (Hvizdova 2018). It plays a significant role in developing countries
such as India, which have a rich, multi-cultural and religious heritage. Religious
tourism must be promoted in a manner that is in tune with India’s agenda to achieve
the SDGs. In general, it has been observed that the environmental impact of religious
tourism has been perceived negatively by the local community (Alipour et al. 2017).
This study is divided into sections—the next section discusses the methodology
and data used, followed by a section on the significance and sustainability concerns of
religious tourism in India. In the second-to-last section, the case of religious tourism
in the hill states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand is discussed, and the last
section concludes.
2 Methodology and Data
The study has a qualitative research design and adopts the descriptive case study
approach. It makes use of both primary and secondary data. The primary data is
in the form of personal observations of the authors from travels in the states of
Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, as well as an expert survey. The expert survey
was conducted by one of the authors in February 2020, in the form of ten faceto-face semi-structured interviews with academicians, policymakers, experts from
NGOs and government officials. In addition, informal meetings were conducted to
gain a better understanding of the environment and sustainability issues.
The secondary data that were reviewed consisted of existing literature, official
government reports and statistics. The differences between pilgrims and tourists are
vague from the perspective of economic, social and environmental impact in the
current times (Durán-Sánchez et al. 2018). For the purpose of simplicity, in this
study the term ‘visitor’ denotes both the pilgrim as well as a simple tourist.
D. Gambhir et al.
environmental impact and needs to be monitored, planned and promoted with focus
on SD.
Tourism in India is a growing sector that has being promoted strongly by the
government in recent years. The growth and expansion of tourism in a country also
improves the projection of its soft power and image (Bhonsale 2019). There must
be integrated planning in order to make tourism a part of the sustainable development strategy for any nation, which includes considering tourist potential, awareness
generation, and tapping niche segments, such as heritage tourism, rural tourism,
spiritual tourism, culinary tourism, etc. (Nail et al. 2012).
Religious tourism has been prevalent around the world since ancient times and
has economic as well as cultural importance. It ‘satisfies religious and spiritual needs
as well as related art, cultural and historical and other values’ (Dimitrov 2019). It
has enabled ‘regions to grow, residents to raise living standards and social ties in
communities’ (Hvizdova 2018). It plays a significant role in developing countries
such as India, which have a rich, multi-cultural and religious heritage. Religious
tourism must be promoted in a manner that is in tune with India’s agenda to achieve
the SDGs. In general, it has been observed that the environmental impact of religious
tourism has been perceived negatively by the local community (Alipour et al. 2017).
This study is divided into sections—the next section discusses the methodology
and data used, followed by a section on the significance and sustainability concerns of
religious tourism in India. In the second-to-last section, the case of religious tourism
in the hill states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand is discussed, and the last
section concludes.
2 Methodology and Data
The study has a qualitative research design and adopts the descriptive case study
approach. It makes use of both primary and secondary data. The primary data is
in the form of personal observations of the authors from travels in the states of
Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, as well as an expert survey. The expert survey
was conducted by one of the authors in February 2020, in the form of ten faceto-face semi-structured interviews with academicians, policymakers, experts from
NGOs and government officials. In addition, informal meetings were conducted to
gain a better understanding of the environment and sustainability issues.
The secondary data that were reviewed consisted of existing literature, official
government reports and statistics. The differences between pilgrims and tourists are
vague from the perspective of economic, social and environmental impact in the
current times (Durán-Sánchez et al. 2018). For the purpose of simplicity, in this
study the term ‘visitor’ denotes both the pilgrim as well as a simple tourist.