Tourism Impacts: A Study of Tourist Perception in Leh

This study is an attempt to understand the perceptions of impacts by tourists in Leh district of Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir. Tourists form one of the most important stakeholders and their opinions and perceptions are vital to understanding and sustaining the tourism industry. For this study, tourists were grouped into international and domestic; male and female; and their perceptions towards both positive and negative impacts as well as difference in perceptions (vis-a-vis. international vs. domestic and male vs. female) was studied. Results of the study indicated that the negative impact-‘increased accumulation of waste’ and the positive impact -‘increased opportunities for shopping’ found stronger opinion by tourists. As far as difference in perceptions of tourists was concerned, it was found that international tourists perceived more negative impacts than their domestic counterparts and domestic tourists perceived more positive impacts than international tourists. As far as difference in perceptions of male and female tourists was concerned, it was found that male tourists had a stronger perception than females for most of the impacts. However, male tourists perceived environmental impacts more strongly than their female counterparts and female tourists perceived socio-cultural impacts more strongly than male tourists.