'Ugly buildings, zero experience': Sanjeev Sanyal on what's broken in Indian tourism

India's tourism strategy is fundamentally flawed because it focuses on monuments instead of crafting experiences, economist Sanjeev Sanyal has said. He believes India has not understood tourism and that a complete rethinking is required.

"We need to understand tourism in what it is. It is about the experience. We unfortunately think it's about some monument - and not about the wider experience," Sanyal said while speaking in a podcast conversation with Sangam Talks. "In the end, you must feel happy and joyful from the experience of that tourism, whatever kind of tourism it is. It should be a good experience. We, on the other hand, try to do it totally differently."

To illustrate how this mindset plays out, Sanyal shared an interaction with a Uttar Pradesh tourism official during the construction of the Agra Expressway. "That person was very excited - 'this is fantastic, great for tourism to see the Taj, because now you can go in the morning and come back in the evening'. I was just appalled. I have nothing against having a good highway to get to the Taj, but you have completely misunderstood what the experience is. If he is going in the morning and coming back, what tourism has happened? Nothing, he paid some 500 rupees maybe to enter the thing and came back."

The economist argued that the objective should be to retain tourists in the city to drive local economic activity. "I want that person to go there, spend a night or two, pay for all the services there, which will create jobs - paying the taxes, having a nice drink. Whatever generates higher taxes, he should be encouraged to do in Agra. The purpose is not to have a fast getaway from Agra, but to stay in Agra and enjoy the experience."

Sanyal said that real value does not come from ticketing at monuments but from the broader hospitality ecosystem. After all, he added, going inside the Taj is not where I am earning money. "I am getting some 500 rupees from it. It costs more money to sit on the other side of the Taj and have a beer. So, I need to clean the river - why not have gondolas going back and forth? That is the experience that we sell."

He criticised the government's tendency to build concrete structures in scenic locations, calling it a "joyless" and "Soviet kind of" approach to tourism. "In many places, you will see there is a beautiful waterfall, and some state tourism corporation has built some PWD-looking building and has destroyed the whole look of the place. Or we will have a lake somewhere in some city, we will build a marine drive kind of thing right next to it. Why? Let people walk along the thing. That is, in fact, the experience. Not driving past it."

Sanyal added that even a slight inconvenience can add to the charm if designed properly. "You can have a windy road going to that place. It's fine. If it's an enjoyable clean road with nice things to see, people will enjoy the experience. That's what tourism is, which we do not understand. We understand it in an almost industrial efficiency way - and then therefore building a cheap PWD department, ugly, brutalist building right in front of a beautiful waterfall is somehow okay."

He also pointed to a design school in Meghalaya to highlight how institutional aesthetics are neglected. "Go to Cherrapunji, you've got a new NID there, it's a design school. Built with the most ugliest possible architecture, which is not even conducive to that place. At least if it had some nice roofs, it would look like something related to a place that rains heavily. It's brutalist square PWD buildings. We've lost the sense of aesthetics."

When asked whether the government's contract model - especially the L1 system, which awards contracts to the lowest bidder - was responsible, Sanyal said the problem lay deeper. "Maybe, yes. But it doesn't derive from L1. It derives from a lack of self-awareness. Therefore, we have to think of ourselves as a civilisation. It's not about building that building there. It's not about the experience. It's about having some pride in that thing. Whereas, somebody is thinking of this as a government contract. It is not about the contract. It's about creating something worthwhile in a place that you're proud of. It requires a certain level of pride in what you're doing."

He said officials often hide behind rules without taking responsibility for design outcomes. "After all, nothing in the general contracting rules, GFR rules, says that you have to build an ugly building there. L1 comes from a lack of pride. L1 is blamed repeatedly, but L1 happens because of a lack of pride. If the officials who are trying to do something better than L1, there is full freedom there to do it."

He cited pre-independence government architecture to show that aesthetics were once a priority, even within the same system. "After all, the PWD department only built Victoria Terminus. And it was the PWD department that built North Block, South Block, and Rashtrapati Bhavan. So, they could do it in the British period. Why can't they do it now? Because the British had a certain level of pride. They knew at some point they would have to leave - and we would remember them."

India is increasingly seen as falling behind in the tourism race, losing ground to emerging Asian hotspots like Vietnam and Sri Lanka. Consider Vietnam - a much smaller country - which attracted approximately 17.6 million international tourists in 2024. In contrast, India recorded just 9.66 million foreign tourist arrivals.