Contrarian
ELITE MEMBER
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2006
- Messages
- 11,571
- Reaction score
- 4
Record number of Pakistanis visited India last year
Himanshi Dhawan,TNN | Jul 5, 2014, 02.53 AM IST
READ MORE Pakistanis visited India last year|Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif|Foreign tourist arrivals
Travel from Pakistan rose to a six-year high, touching 1.11 lakh tourists in 2013.
NEW DELHI: In a year where India-Pak relations nose-dived because of frequent LoC skirmishes and the beheading of two Indian soldiers, tourists from Pakistan appeared undeterred. Travel from Pakistan rose to a six-year high, touching 1.11 lakh tourists in 2013. This is the highest since 2007 when India received 1.06 lakh tourists from Pakistan.
Latest data on foreign tourist arrivals from the tourism ministry reveals that arrivals from Pakistan registered a 86.80% growth since 2012, increasing from 59,846 to 1.11 lakh in 2013. This is the highest growth among the top 45 source countries for India. Incidentally, there has been no promotion or liberalization of visa norms with Pakistan. In fact, in 2012, the two countries had signed a liberalized visa agreement but it was not rolled out because of ceasefire violations across the LoC and killings on the border.
Industry sources said expanding business opportunities and better healthcare facilities in the country drew Pakistani nationals to India. There has been a recent thaw between the two countries after PM Narendra Modi invited Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif for his swearing-in ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
Other high growth countries include the Russian Federation where the number of tourists increased from 1.77 lakh in 2012 to 2.59 lakh in 2013, recording a 45.96% growth. Countries in the West Asia region including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia also registered growth. Tourists from Kuwait increased by 60% from 5,256 in 2012 to 8,461 last year while travelers from Saudi showed an increase of 33.5% from 32,127 tourists in 2012 to 42,892 in 2013.
The top 10 source countries for India remained constant including the US, UK, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Russian Federation, Canada, Germany, France, Malaysia and Japan. About 10.08 lakh tourists from the US came to India in 2013 as compared to 10.03 lakh while UK was a distant second with 8.09 lakh tourists last year compared to 7.88 lakh in 2012. Travelers from Bangladesh increased by 7.70% from 4.8 lakh in 2012 to 5.2 lakh in 2013.
Year....tourists from Pakistan
2007....1.06 lakh
2008...85,529
2009...53,137
2010...58,152
2011...48,640
2012...59,846
2013...1.11 lakh
Record number of Pakistanis visited India last year - The Times of India
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My views on the matter as expressed on another thread:
You bridge gaps with people who are better, you dont bridge gaps with a population that has been radicalized over decades, that has not been living in a pluralistic society and is a violent society.
If they are given visas, they will come here and transport their ideas of shariah and non-Muslims to people living here.
We need to have a transactional relationship with Pakistan - one in which they dont trouble us in Kashmir and we do not trouble them in other areas. Where we can have mutual trade.
Other than that, we dont require anything else. And this can be accomplished by giving visas to just the various elites of Pakistan. They are the ones who actually make decisions in Pakistan.
We must actively reduce the number of common Pakistanis coming to India.
1 lakh Pakistani's coming to India each year is nothing short of a travesty!Even if they influence 2 Indians, that is 2 lakh Indians with Pakistani vision of shariah and non-Muslims each year!
Now that we have a different Government in charge, it must reduce this number to less than a quarter!
@niaz sir, @Icarus We can continue our discussion from the other thread here. It is more relevant.
Himanshi Dhawan,TNN | Jul 5, 2014, 02.53 AM IST
READ MORE Pakistanis visited India last year|Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif|Foreign tourist arrivals
Travel from Pakistan rose to a six-year high, touching 1.11 lakh tourists in 2013.
NEW DELHI: In a year where India-Pak relations nose-dived because of frequent LoC skirmishes and the beheading of two Indian soldiers, tourists from Pakistan appeared undeterred. Travel from Pakistan rose to a six-year high, touching 1.11 lakh tourists in 2013. This is the highest since 2007 when India received 1.06 lakh tourists from Pakistan.
Latest data on foreign tourist arrivals from the tourism ministry reveals that arrivals from Pakistan registered a 86.80% growth since 2012, increasing from 59,846 to 1.11 lakh in 2013. This is the highest growth among the top 45 source countries for India. Incidentally, there has been no promotion or liberalization of visa norms with Pakistan. In fact, in 2012, the two countries had signed a liberalized visa agreement but it was not rolled out because of ceasefire violations across the LoC and killings on the border.
Industry sources said expanding business opportunities and better healthcare facilities in the country drew Pakistani nationals to India. There has been a recent thaw between the two countries after PM Narendra Modi invited Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif for his swearing-in ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
Other high growth countries include the Russian Federation where the number of tourists increased from 1.77 lakh in 2012 to 2.59 lakh in 2013, recording a 45.96% growth. Countries in the West Asia region including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia also registered growth. Tourists from Kuwait increased by 60% from 5,256 in 2012 to 8,461 last year while travelers from Saudi showed an increase of 33.5% from 32,127 tourists in 2012 to 42,892 in 2013.
The top 10 source countries for India remained constant including the US, UK, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Russian Federation, Canada, Germany, France, Malaysia and Japan. About 10.08 lakh tourists from the US came to India in 2013 as compared to 10.03 lakh while UK was a distant second with 8.09 lakh tourists last year compared to 7.88 lakh in 2012. Travelers from Bangladesh increased by 7.70% from 4.8 lakh in 2012 to 5.2 lakh in 2013.
Year....tourists from Pakistan
2007....1.06 lakh
2008...85,529
2009...53,137
2010...58,152
2011...48,640
2012...59,846
2013...1.11 lakh
Record number of Pakistanis visited India last year - The Times of India
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My views on the matter as expressed on another thread:
You bridge gaps with people who are better, you dont bridge gaps with a population that has been radicalized over decades, that has not been living in a pluralistic society and is a violent society.
If they are given visas, they will come here and transport their ideas of shariah and non-Muslims to people living here.
We need to have a transactional relationship with Pakistan - one in which they dont trouble us in Kashmir and we do not trouble them in other areas. Where we can have mutual trade.
Other than that, we dont require anything else. And this can be accomplished by giving visas to just the various elites of Pakistan. They are the ones who actually make decisions in Pakistan.
We must actively reduce the number of common Pakistanis coming to India.
1 lakh Pakistani's coming to India each year is nothing short of a travesty!Even if they influence 2 Indians, that is 2 lakh Indians with Pakistani vision of shariah and non-Muslims each year!
Now that we have a different Government in charge, it must reduce this number to less than a quarter!
@niaz sir, @Icarus We can continue our discussion from the other thread here. It is more relevant.
Last edited:
