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This paper studies the role of heritage walks and tours in promoting inclusive education. It assesses if these walks are an effective method of exhibiting culture and facilitating inclusive heritage learning. The purpose of this paper is to attempt to establish that walks can play an imperative role in creating greater sensitivity towards heritage and conservation.

The study uses a case study approach using mixed methods. Participants for qualitative interviews were chosen using purposive sampling and six interview schedules were sent to walk leaders. Walk participant data were collected through participant observation and standardised survey with randomly selected participants of the case walks. Surveys were sent to participants electronically.

Heritage walks play a crucial role in not only imparting knowledge about history and heritage but also as a tool for learning other crucial skills, competencies, values, attitudes, etc. This paper attempts to highlight that walks are an effective and inclusive way to shed light on the alternative and forgotten stories. As an educational tool these walks can not only encourage the development of historical knowledge and appreciation but also assist in the development of competency to “de-construct” mainstream “grand narratives”, questioning and learning about the forgotten.

This paper has limited itself to the study of select cases in New Delhi. Since the study has followed a case study design, it does not produce a largely generalizable result, but rather examines and understands the dynamics of particular walks and produces insights that may well be applicable in other contexts. Whilst this paper makes an attempt to understand the changes in perception and attitudes, it does not study behavioural changes.

In the long run, walks allow for meaningful citizen engagement with tangible heritage such as monuments as well as intangible heritage such as practices and festivals. This allows for appreciation for the value of heritage resources and leads to a demand for better conservation and preservation from the authorities. In a few cases, local citizens themselves lead heritage management and development activities in a bid to promote their local culture. This paper has shown that heritage walks can be helpful tools in giving “forgotten” voices and stories recognition in contemporary society.

As heritage walks have recently gained popularity, there has been very limited research in the field especially linking heritage walks to heritage education. This is especially true for India. Even a city like New Delhi, which boasts of a robust heritage and is one of the tourism hubs of the country, heritage walks have been a very recent phenomenon. This research aims to address this lacuna in academic research and contribute meaningfully to the field of heritage education and conservation by studying how heritage walks support and promote inclusive heritage education.

COVID-19 pandemic has drastically altered and shaped the world in the past two years. Almost every aspect of life has been affected by the pandemic including World Tourism and Travel. One of the major strategies of the national governments across the world to contain the pandemic was to restrict the movement of people thus directly affecting the tourism industry. As the industry slowly emerges from the shadows of the pandemic, this chapter gives an overview of the impact on the travel industry, measures adopted by some countries and broad strategies to make the sector resilient for the times to come. This chapter provides a timely summary of global strategies to fight the impact of the pandemic with a focus on the tourism sector. In doing so, we also provide insights into the Indian travel industry.

India is one of the fastest developing economies, but it faces numerous socioeconomic problems, such as hunger, poverty, under- and unemployment, gender inequity and illiteracy. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) funding at the corporate level could tackle these socioeconomic problems, providing support to the nation’s overall development. Mandated CSR expenditures, in alignment with the achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) of the United Nations, would support the nation’s contributions to building a sustainable future. Several questions, however, remain. Thus, this study aims to explore relationships between a company’s gross and net profits and its expenditures for CSR; and mapped the specific CSR activities used to address each of the 17 UN SDGs and then draw implications for human resource development (HRD).

The data were gathered from published annual reports (2019–23) of 60 Fortune 500 Indian companies. A zero-order correlation was used to find the relationship between CSR expenditure and gross, as well as net, profits. Furthermore, the CSR activities of the sample were mapped with the UN SDGs.

There was a positive, moderate to strong correlation between CSR expenditures and gross profit (r = 0.82, p < 0.01), but for net profit, the correlation was strong (r = 0.85, p < 0.01). All CSR activities mapped to at least one of the SDGs.

The alignment of CSR activities and SDGs based on Fortune 500 Indian companies has not yet been explored. Also, no study to date discusses the gaps in the CSR expenditures for specific UN SDGs.