West Asia emerges top tourist source for India in 2008

West Asia accounted for the highest number of foreign tourists visiting India, out of an estimated 5.37 million, during 2008, figures provided by the ministry of tourism showed.

The maximum growth of tourist arrivals in 2008 was observed for West Asia (20.9 per cent), followed by Eastern Europe (18.5 per cent), Central and South America (12.7 per cent) and South East Asia (10.5 per cent). 

The growth rate in 2008 was lower than the all-India growth rate of 5.6 per cent in tourist arriving from North America (4.4 per cent), East Asia (3.6 per cent), Western Europe (2.9 per cent) and Africa (2.7 per cent).

The top ten countries for foreign tourists in India during 2008 were USA (8,27,866), UK (7,87,197), Bangladesh (5,40,092), Sri Lanka (2,28,548), Canada (2,23,587), France (2,17,816), Germany (2,09,252), Japan (1,50,732), Australia (1,48,055) and Malaysia (1,19,040). Visitors from these ten countries constituted about 64.34 per cent of total foreign tourists arrived in India during 2008.

The maximum growth rate in tourist arrivals was observed for Oman (54.9 per cent), followed by Myanmar (54.0 per cent), UAE (44.0 per cent), Afghanistan (43.4 per cent), Nigeria (29.8 per cent), Denmark (24.1 per cent) and Brazil (21.8 per cent). The share of these countries in total tourist, however, was quite low.

A decline in tourist arrivals was observed in respect of countries like Pakistan (-25.1 per cent), Finland and Kenya         (-10.1 per cent each), Mauritius (-8.5 per cent) and South Africa (-6.2 per cent) in 2008 compared to 2007.