India’s tourism industry is among the fastest growing in the world. The country saw 5.2 million international tourists last year but they numbered nearly 10 million in 2019 before the Covid-19 pandemic reduced footfalls. Tourism, domestic and international, plays a significant role in the economic growth of the nation, creating jobs and facilitating infrastructural changes that can help the development of the area. At the national and international levels, it may also aid in the development of sociocultural ties. 

In terms of the total contribution of travel and tourism to GDP in 2019, India is rated 10th out of 185 nations by the World Travel & Tourism Council. The GDP contribution of travel and tourism in 2019 was Rs. 1,368,100 crore (US$ 194.30 billion), or 6.8 percent of the economy. As many as 39 million jobs, or 8 percent of all employment in India in 2020, was related to the tourism industry. According to the Indian Tourism Statistics 2022 report, 677.63 million domestic tourists visited India in 2021. 

However, the influx of technology into the work done by tour guides and photographers has had a mixed outcome – while the introduction of a smartphone and the internet has benefited tourists making their lives easier by allowing easy access to all the information they want, the same devices have meant losses for tour guides and photographers at tourism sites though it opened up avenues for a few of them. 

Krishna Balaram Ghoye, a tour guide at Elephanta Caves for over 27 years, argues that tour guides can provide what the internet cannot. In his experience, tourism has only seen improvement since the onset of the internet “as people find out about tourist places and then approach guides for further information”. Ghoye deals primarily with foreign clients and since he is one of the few who speaks multiple foreign languages, he has not suffered in his business. He does admit that the pandemic hit the industry hard, but his profession is what helped him revive his income once the lockdown was lifted. 

There are government certified tour guides and then there are those who do it as passion work such as history enthusiasts who organise and guide tourists at smaller private levels in organisations like Khaki Tours, Mumbai by Locals, Bombay to Mumbai Tours, and so on. A private tour often includes a personal tour guide, who could be someone with a registered licence or not, but is usually an educated person with academic background in the area of expertise. This, they say, ensures that misinformation is not passed down to their clients and helps to make the entire tourist experience exclusive and enriching. 

Juzer Tambawala, an “Ambassador of Mumbai” volunteer for two years at the private walking tour agency speaks about the improvement in the quality of the tour guide industry since the onset of the new age guides. With the minimum requirement of Hindi and English speaking skills, Khaki Tours, and several other private agencies have initiated degrees for tour guides which require training for a year to become authorized guides. During the good season from March to October, the private guides steer upto 50 guests a day on an average and see a surge  during the weekends. 

However, the twist in the tale is that the clientele for these tours are, what Tambawala calls, “slightly evolved clients”, who belong to a niche section of the society and are into knowing more about history than what is available to them already on the internet. “There is a story behind a building,” says Tambawala, which only a few tour guides with thorough knowledge and experience can share. This is where private guides with recognised degreed bridge the gap between local guides with basic knowledge and clients who wish to know beyond easy internet information. 

Private agencies like Khaki Tours receive both Indian and foreign clients equally. However, only the elite section of the Indian society seem to have been indulging in this activity as, in Tambawala’s words, the majority of the Indian population belongs to the working class and cannot afford luxuries like expensive tours as part of their recreational activities.

 

Globalization has only helped the industry as private agencies have been drowning with clients. “There is never going to be a dearth of somebody wanting to get some kind of a guide,” explains Tambawala who believes that the real competition to these private agencies are movie theaters which attract more people as they entertain their guests and cost about the same as a heritage walk. 

The status of well-qualified or well-trained tour guides is good and rising, according to  Jitendra Jadhav, Assistant Director of India Tourism, Mumbai. According to him, any “sensible tourist would go to a tour guide in order to know about things other than what they can already find on the internet.” Government agencies like India Tourism have taken initiatives like a one year course to bridge the gap between misinformation provided by the local tour guides and tourists.  

Dr. Supriya Rai, a tourist visiting Kanheri caves in Sanjay Gandhi National park points out the need for tour guides to explain to “ordinary people like us” what these places are about. She argues that if guides with useful knowledge are employed everywhere, every hotel, every site and so on to conduct heritage walks, then people would automatically opt for them and boost the demand for good guides. She points out that language is often a hindering factor when guides approach tourists and there is a need for guides who could speak languages other than Hindi and English. 

It seems that there is a clear class divide among tourists which then reflects in the clientele and business that tour guides are able to get. Middle class or lower middle class travellers, even when they tour an ancient place, cannot seem to afford the luxury of well-informed tour guides on location. This also means that information and history available with the private guides is undergoing the process of gatekeeping – reaching only those who can afford to pay for the information, knowledge and education. This is not how it should be.