Sunil Kainthola – “We stay in a gram sabha, so as advised by the Mahila Mangal Dal of Lata, the lodge is accepting booking only after confirming that the guest is providing a negative COVID-19 report.” 

In a bid to boost the pandemic hit tourism sector in Uttarakhand, the state government launched an extraordinary initiative where it threw open the state to attract more tourists.  The “Tourist Incentive Coupon (TIC) scheme  offers tourists to the state a discount of Rs 1000 on their stay in hotels and homestays. In order to avail this scheme the visitors will have to register themselves on the government portal under ‘tourist’ category, upon which they’ll be issued a coupon which they can use during their stay in a hotel or homestay. The discount will be limited to Rs 1000 or 25% of the hotel charge per day, whichever is less. Uttarakhand has lost approximately 7000 crore due to the lockdown imposed in the light of COVID-19 pandemic.

Though the scheme was introduced with the right intentions, it has found few takers in Lata village of Uttarakhand. While the inhabitants admit that most of the tourist season has gone by this year with next to no revenue for them, they fear tourists now will put them at great risk of contracting the virus. 

Lata Village lies in the Niti Valley, at the entry point to the Nanda Devi National Park. The tiny village spread over 195.72 hectares, is located  164 km away from Dehradun and 135 km away from Mussoorie in the  Chamoli district of Uttarakhand. It has a population of less than 500, as per the 2011 census. It is a popular trekking point and is tourism-dependent for its sustenance with a lodge and a couple of homestays being its main source of revenue. The tourist season has almost gone by and thanks to the COVID-19 situation, people are struggling.