It is time to party and celebrate Kashmir's Gulmarg

With the New Year approaching, Kashmir is gearing up to welcome 2019.

Valley's ski destination of Gulmarg, which is covered under a carpet of snow, is at the heart of the celebrations this year.

The destination is seeing a steady stream of tourists and locals arriving for New Year revelry. Musical concerts, gala dinners, night skiing, snowboarding, bonfire and other events have been planned at the ski resort.

"We will be having a function at Gulmarg golf club. We are planning night skiing under lights but that depends on the level of snow. We will be having cultural programmes. There will be a short skit, Kashmiri cultural programme. It will be a four-hour event, which will be held between 8 pm and midnight," said Nasir Khan, assistant director, Tourism department, Gulmarg.

More than 5,000 tourists are expected to arrive at Gulmarg for New Year celebrations. "Our capacity is around 2000. But many more will come and some of them will go back. We are keeping the provisions of camp fire," said Khan.

The New Year celebrations at Gulmarg come after two years of turmoil that has affected the tourist footfall considerably. The preparations for the celebration are to set the stage for instilling confidence among tourists so that there is a considerable flow of visitors to Kashmir in the upcoming summer season.

Official figures reveal that around 11.61 lakh tourists visited Kashmir valley last year. Around 61.88 lakh people visited the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi at Katra in Jammu and 2.63 lakh tourists visited Ladakh during last year.

"We are 100 per cent sold out (in Gulmarg) on December 31. But there has been considerable drop in tourists since 2016 and we have suffered huge losses. We hope this year tourists will visit Kashmir in summer," said Mukhtar Ahmad Shah, president Hoteliers Club, Gulmarg.

The tourism sector accounts for around 7 per cent of the state's Gross Domestic Product and lakhs of people are directly and indirectly associated with the trade.

Sensing the urgency to boost the tourism sector, the Jammu and Kashmir government has gone into overdrive and decided to pump huge amounts of money for tourism infrastructure.

"There will be Rs 130 crore for tourism promotion in addition to Rs 2,000 crore under PMDP for infrastructure up-gradation," said an official spokesman.

HOPE FOR SUMMER

“We are 100 per cent sold out  (in Gulmarg) on December 31. But there has been considerable drop in tourists since 2016 and we have suffered huge losses. We hope this year tourists will visit Kashmir in summer,” said Mukhtar Ahmad Shah, president Hoteliers Club, Gulmarg