Need to delay openings

The first nine days have proven fruitful yet again for the Tulip garden as the authorities have claimed that over one lakh people have visited the garden so far since its opening on March 20, 2023. On average, at least 15000 to 17000 people would visit the garden in the first one week of its opening this year while the situation has slowly changed as the rush has reduced to 9000-10000 per day after the beginning of holy month, Ramadhan. The flow of visitors could have been high in the normal days, but seems the decision to open the garden was taken in a haste, which deprived the people to visit the garden this year due to the holy month of Ramadhan, causing huge losses to the state exchequer. Kashmir has been witnessing a good tourist season for the past over one year as a record high number of tourist footfall was recorded in the year 2022. The government stated that 1.88 crore tourist footfall was recorded last year while there are expectations of further boost to the tourism footfall this year. However, the government needs to take decisions keeping in view all the circumstances so that there is no halt to the rush of the visitors at the seasonal gardens and the state exchequer will not face any losses at a time when the flow of tourist arrival is increasing at a rapid pace.