Atithya: A Journal of Hospitality

Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access
Open Access Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Restricted Access Subscription Access

Emergence of Spiritual Tourism and its Impact on Hospitality Industry with Special Reference to Uttarakhand Region


Affiliations
1 Pacific University, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India
     

   Subscribe/Renew Journal


Spirituality, in general, has recently emerged as an important subject of research in social and business areas. This has given birth to a new dimension to the tourism industry, called ‘Spiritual tourism’. It has been observed that there has been an increase in the awareness and research interest in the thematic field of spiritual tourism. Tourism is an age old activity associated with civilized nations around the world. Thus, tourism literature too carries a long history along with it. However, there are very few areas in tourism which has been taken through the domain of scientific investigation only recently. Spiritual tourism is one such area in which only a few researchers had carried out their work in a systematic and scientific way.
Uttarakhand is a state located in the Northern Himalayan Region in India and it has been a prime spot of tourism due to its magnificently diverse landscapes, high biodiversity enough religious tourist potential and rich cultural heritage. Tourism has also generated a good source of income and employment to youths and rural masses. Tourism is one of the fastest-growing economic sectors in the global economy. Tourism has significant environmental, cultural, social, and economic effects, both in positive and negative terms. Tourism has been noted as the world’s largest and fastest growing industry. Tourism, as a major service sector industry in state’s economy, has multi-dimensional impacts on the society such as Economic, Social and Cultural, Environmental, Crowding and congestion, Community attitudes, Services and Taxes.
The emergence of Spiritual tourism has given a boost to the tourism industry when we talk about the tourism trends in Uttarakhand region. Although, people used to travel to satisfy their religious beliefs since ages but the concept of Spiritual Tourism is bit different from pilgrimage or religious tourism and can be promoted well as a tremendous tourism product to yield better results in Uttarakhand. Presence of some amazing and unmatched spiritual destination in Uttarakhand, aids to the enhancement and promotion of Spiritual tourism in the state.
The main objectives of the paper is to focus on emerging trends and other aspects of Spiritual tourism that has a direct or indirect impact on Hospitality Industry operating in the region. This paper focuses on the emerging trends of spiritual tourism oriented research activities and explores the potentials for future work in tourism research. This paper is an analysis of the available and relevant literatures in the field of spiritual tourism with special emphasis on the Uttarakhand state of India.This paper will also discuss the challenges and problems that comes in the way in order to introduce new trends to the field of Tourism and Hospitality industry.

Keywords

Spiritual Tourism, Impact, Emerging Trends, Hospitality Industry.
User
Subscription Login to verify subscription
Notifications
Font Size

  • Aggarwal, A. K., Guglani, M., & Goel, R. K (2008). Spiritual & yoga tourism: A case study on experience of foreign tourists visiting. Conference on Tourism in India - Challenges Ahead.

  • Ahmed, D. N. (2013). Sustainable tourism development in Uttarakhand region of India. International Journal of Managemnet and Socila Sciences Research (IJMSSR), 2.

  • Agrawal, M., Choudhary, H., & Tripathi, G. (2010). Enhancing Buddhist tourism in India: An exploratoray research. Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, 2(5), 477-493.

  • Banerjee, M. (2013). Spiritual tourism: A tool for SocioCultural and. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR).

  • Bowen, J. T. (1998). Market segmentation in hospitality research: No longer a sequential process. International Journel of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 10(7), 289-296.

  • Brown. (1998). The Spiritual Tourist: A personal adyssey through the outer reaches of belief. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing.

  • Burton. (1855). The pilgrimage to Al-Medinah and Meccah. London: Spottswoode and Co.

  • Cimino, L. (1999). Choosing my religion. American Demographics.

  • Clarke, & Bowen. (2002). Reflections on tourist satisfaction research: Past, present and future. Journel of Vacation Maeketing.

  • Cohen, E. (1979). Sociology of Tourism. Annals of Tourism.

  • Cohen, E. (2006). Religious tourism as an educational experience. New York.

  • Delbecq. (2000). Spirituality for business leadership: Reporting on a pilot course for MBAs and CEOs.

  • Journel of Management Inquiry, 9, 117-128.

  • Gladstone. (2005). From pilgrimage to package tour. New York: Routledge.

  • Goldberg, M. (2007). The rise of chirstian nationalism. The Humanist, 67(5), 29-32.

  • Haq, F., & Jackson, A. J. (2006). The recognition of marketing of spiritual tourism as a significant new area in. Tourism: The Spiritual Dimension Conference. UK.

  • Haq, F., & Wong, H. Y. Is spiritual tourism a new strategy for marketing Islam. Journal of Islam Marketing , 1(2), 136-148.

  • Hill, B. J. (2002). Tourism and religion, by Boris Vukonic. Internatonal Journal of Tourism Research, 4(4), 327-328.

  • Kale, S. H. (2004). Spirituality, Religion and Globalization. Journal of Macromarketing, 92.

  • Kiat, J. W. (2007). Spirituality and Health. Medical Journal of Australia, 423-425.

  • Konz, R. (1999). Maintaining an organizational spirituality: No easy task. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 200-210.

  • Kotler, B. M. (2008). Marketing for hospiatality and tourism (8th ed.). New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.

  • Medhekar, A., & Haq, F. (2012). Development of spiritual tourism circuits: The case of India. GSTF Journal on Business Review (GBR), 2(2) 212-218.

  • Nag, A. (2013). A study of tourism industry of Himanchal Pradesh with special reference to ecotourism. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing & Management Review, 2(4).

  • Phukan, H., Rahman, Z., & Devdutt, P. (2012). Effect of spiritual tourism on financial health of the Uttarakhand State of India. International Journal of Research in Commerce, IT, & Management (IJRCM), 2(2), 1-7. ISSN: 2231-5756.

  • Phukan, H. (2014). A study on tourism logistics inthe spiritual sites of Haridwar and Rishikesh in Uttarakhand. International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering, 4(9).

  • Stefko, R., Kiralova, A., & Mudrík, M. (2014). Strategic marketing communication in pilgrimage tourism. International Conference on Strategic Innovative Marketing. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 175(2015), 423-430.

  • Sharma,V., Agrawal, R., & Chandra, P. Religious to spiritual tourism transformation journey of Uttarakhand - A hill state in India. Proceedings of the International Conference on Tourism, Hospitality and Marketing. Mauritius.

  • Suri, R., & Rao, J. (2014). Impact of spiritual marketing on different segments of tourist and their evaluation of the site. Journal of Business & Economic Policy, 1(1).

  • Sanjeev, V. J. (2010). Managing customer experience for spiritual and cultural tourism. Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes.

  • Satpathy, B., & Mahalik, D. (2013). A study on spirtual tourist site selection under multi criteria. South Asian Journal of Tourism and Heritage, 3(1).

  • Timothy, D. J., & Olsen, D. H. (2006). Tourism, religion and spiritual journeys. New York: Routledge.

  • Viyayanand, S. (2012). Socio-economic impacts in pilgrimage tourism. International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research, 2(1), 3.


Abstract Views: 375

PDF Views: 0




  • Emergence of Spiritual Tourism and its Impact on Hospitality Industry with Special Reference to Uttarakhand Region

Abstract Views: 375  |  PDF Views: 0

Authors

Yashwant Singh Rawal
Pacific University, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India
Vikas Sah
Pacific University, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India

Abstract


Spirituality, in general, has recently emerged as an important subject of research in social and business areas. This has given birth to a new dimension to the tourism industry, called ‘Spiritual tourism’. It has been observed that there has been an increase in the awareness and research interest in the thematic field of spiritual tourism. Tourism is an age old activity associated with civilized nations around the world. Thus, tourism literature too carries a long history along with it. However, there are very few areas in tourism which has been taken through the domain of scientific investigation only recently. Spiritual tourism is one such area in which only a few researchers had carried out their work in a systematic and scientific way.
Uttarakhand is a state located in the Northern Himalayan Region in India and it has been a prime spot of tourism due to its magnificently diverse landscapes, high biodiversity enough religious tourist potential and rich cultural heritage. Tourism has also generated a good source of income and employment to youths and rural masses. Tourism is one of the fastest-growing economic sectors in the global economy. Tourism has significant environmental, cultural, social, and economic effects, both in positive and negative terms. Tourism has been noted as the world’s largest and fastest growing industry. Tourism, as a major service sector industry in state’s economy, has multi-dimensional impacts on the society such as Economic, Social and Cultural, Environmental, Crowding and congestion, Community attitudes, Services and Taxes.
The emergence of Spiritual tourism has given a boost to the tourism industry when we talk about the tourism trends in Uttarakhand region. Although, people used to travel to satisfy their religious beliefs since ages but the concept of Spiritual Tourism is bit different from pilgrimage or religious tourism and can be promoted well as a tremendous tourism product to yield better results in Uttarakhand. Presence of some amazing and unmatched spiritual destination in Uttarakhand, aids to the enhancement and promotion of Spiritual tourism in the state.
The main objectives of the paper is to focus on emerging trends and other aspects of Spiritual tourism that has a direct or indirect impact on Hospitality Industry operating in the region. This paper focuses on the emerging trends of spiritual tourism oriented research activities and explores the potentials for future work in tourism research. This paper is an analysis of the available and relevant literatures in the field of spiritual tourism with special emphasis on the Uttarakhand state of India.This paper will also discuss the challenges and problems that comes in the way in order to introduce new trends to the field of Tourism and Hospitality industry.

Keywords


Spiritual Tourism, Impact, Emerging Trends, Hospitality Industry.

References