Behind in the tourism race? Just 99.52 lakh foreign tourists visited India in 2024
According to the data, FTAs stood at 27.45 lakh in 2020, 15.27 lakh in 2021, 64.37 lakh in 2022, 95.21 lakh in 2023, and 99.52 lakh in 2024.
- Aug 18, 2025,
- Updated Aug 18, 2025 10:03 PM IST
India recorded 99.52 lakh foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs) in 2024, with the United States and Bangladesh topping the list of source countries over the last five years, Union Culture Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat told the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Shekhawat shared the government's data in a written response, listing the top ten source markets for FTAs between 2020 and 2024. The countries were the US, Bangladesh, the UK, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Germany, France, and Singapore.
According to the data, FTAs stood at 27.45 lakh in 2020, 15.27 lakh in 2021, 64.37 lakh in 2022, 95.21 lakh in 2023, and 99.52 lakh in 2024. International Tourist Arrivals (ITAs) - a category that includes FTAs and arrivals of non-resident nationals - were recorded at 63.37 lakh in 2020, 70.10 lakh in 2021, 143.30 lakh in 2022, 188.99 lakh in 2023 and 205.69 lakh in 2024.
Bangladesh was the top source market for FTAs in 2020 and 2023, while the US led the rankings in 2021, 2022, and 2024.
While India crossed pre-pandemic levels, some voices have in the recent past raised concerns that the country is falling behind even smaller nations in the tourism sector. Vietnam, a country with a much smaller population, attracted approximately 17.6 million international tourists in 2024, compared with India's nearly 10 million foreign arrivals.
Author and scientist Dr. Anand Ranganathan criticised India's performance, comparing it with global benchmarks. "A small city like Paris, one city, attracts 25 million foreign tourists every year. India, a population of 1.4 billion people, attracts 11 million tourists a year," he said at an event organised by WMG Group.
Ranganathan highlighted India's cultural resources. "We are an 8,000-year-old civilization. We have hundreds of languages to impress people by, thousands of cuisines. We have 42 World Heritage Sites. Greece has half those, and yet we attract one-third of the foreign tourists that Greece does," he said.
Citing Bodh Gaya as an example, Ranganathan said, "Bodh Gaya should be the Vatican of the East—it is the place where Lord Buddha attained enlightenment. We have the Bodhi Tree. We have 535 million Buddhists around the world. Japan, South Korea, China—they would be falling over each other to make Bodh Gaya the Vatican of the East. And yet the annual municipal budget of Bodh Gaya is less than the production budget of the failed movie Adipurush — 500 crores."
"Only 0.25 million foreign tourists visited the Bodhi Tree,” he noted, calling attention to poor infrastructure. "UAE has more hotel rooms than India. China has 20 million hotel rooms, we have 0.2 million hotel rooms."
"These are the low-hanging fruits - agriculture, tourism - and what is the state doing? The state is not plucking the low-hanging fruit. The state is watching it rot," he said.
(With inputs from PTI)
India recorded 99.52 lakh foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs) in 2024, with the United States and Bangladesh topping the list of source countries over the last five years, Union Culture Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat told the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Shekhawat shared the government's data in a written response, listing the top ten source markets for FTAs between 2020 and 2024. The countries were the US, Bangladesh, the UK, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Germany, France, and Singapore.
According to the data, FTAs stood at 27.45 lakh in 2020, 15.27 lakh in 2021, 64.37 lakh in 2022, 95.21 lakh in 2023, and 99.52 lakh in 2024. International Tourist Arrivals (ITAs) - a category that includes FTAs and arrivals of non-resident nationals - were recorded at 63.37 lakh in 2020, 70.10 lakh in 2021, 143.30 lakh in 2022, 188.99 lakh in 2023 and 205.69 lakh in 2024.
Bangladesh was the top source market for FTAs in 2020 and 2023, while the US led the rankings in 2021, 2022, and 2024.
While India crossed pre-pandemic levels, some voices have in the recent past raised concerns that the country is falling behind even smaller nations in the tourism sector. Vietnam, a country with a much smaller population, attracted approximately 17.6 million international tourists in 2024, compared with India's nearly 10 million foreign arrivals.
Author and scientist Dr. Anand Ranganathan criticised India's performance, comparing it with global benchmarks. "A small city like Paris, one city, attracts 25 million foreign tourists every year. India, a population of 1.4 billion people, attracts 11 million tourists a year," he said at an event organised by WMG Group.
Ranganathan highlighted India's cultural resources. "We are an 8,000-year-old civilization. We have hundreds of languages to impress people by, thousands of cuisines. We have 42 World Heritage Sites. Greece has half those, and yet we attract one-third of the foreign tourists that Greece does," he said.
Citing Bodh Gaya as an example, Ranganathan said, "Bodh Gaya should be the Vatican of the East—it is the place where Lord Buddha attained enlightenment. We have the Bodhi Tree. We have 535 million Buddhists around the world. Japan, South Korea, China—they would be falling over each other to make Bodh Gaya the Vatican of the East. And yet the annual municipal budget of Bodh Gaya is less than the production budget of the failed movie Adipurush — 500 crores."
"Only 0.25 million foreign tourists visited the Bodhi Tree,” he noted, calling attention to poor infrastructure. "UAE has more hotel rooms than India. China has 20 million hotel rooms, we have 0.2 million hotel rooms."
"These are the low-hanging fruits - agriculture, tourism - and what is the state doing? The state is not plucking the low-hanging fruit. The state is watching it rot," he said.
(With inputs from PTI)