Supreme Court’s recent verdict banning gays in the country has raised the ire of many travel and tourism professionals as they fear its impact of their business and India’s reputation as a tourist destination.
They say that this verdict threatens to kill fledgling attempts by Indian tour operators to grab a slice of the world’s estimated $5-billion “gay tourism” market, travel industry sources said.
They say that this verdict threatens to kill fledgling attempts by Indian tour operators to grab a slice of the world’s estimated $5-billion “gay tourism” market, travel industry sources said.
“This judgment has aborted the gay tourism baby even before it was born,” Sanjay Malhotra of Indjapink told The Telegraph.Indjapink is the first travel firm in India to exclusively cater to LGBT (Lesbian, Gay Bisexual and Transgender) tourism.
It was set up soon after Delhi High Court, in 2009, declared a part of the law that criminalized “carnal intercourse against the order of nature” as unconstitutional, which meant a consensual sexual act between adults in private was no longer an offense. The Supreme Court yesterday overturned that order.
Malhotra said that since yesterday morning, he had been receiving queries from foreign clients who were scheduled to come to India for their Christmas holidays. “We were growing by 100 per cent each year before this judgment came,” he rued.
Read the full report here, E Turbo News
