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The aim of the paper is to explore the challenges and opportunities that the Indian Tourism and Hospitality faces to rebuild itself. The questions discussed include: what is to be done, the role of the Government at the Federal and Provincial level and how should the stakeholders of the tourism ecosystem play out?

The 2020 expectation for Indian Tourism was for a bumper year, a year that would be remembered, but then the pandemic proved to be devastating. This article is based on secondary literature and discussions with industry representatives, which provide guidance and pointers for future preparedness.

The industry went from a difficult situation during the lockdowns, to a scenario of hope and opportunity initiated by domestic travellers, who provided a ray of hope for tourism stakeholders.

In the wake of the pandemic, businesses suffered from a lack of business; people lost jobs, travel came to a standstill and so it was mitigation that was important. The way the tourism ecosystem sought to return to normal and build on it for future has a number of implications for relevant changes to society.

Resilience, restructuring and renewal have characterised the tourism business in India and this paper investigates new dimensions for innovatively managing the situation.

Tourism and hospitality have had a dynamic role in different countries and became the mainstay of the economy. Tourism, if proliferated appropriately, supports countries to accrue the benefits of the industry. Considered to have multiplier effects, tourism banks on visitors who come to a host country from other countries or are domestic visitors who move around the country. Countries such as Thailand, Malaysia, India and the Maldives have depended on Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTA) for several years. More the FTAs, the higher the benefits. India too had the facet of promoting the country as a tourist destination to the world and inviting them to be part of the tourism juggernaut. Unfortunately, the metrics are not in line with the quality of destinations in India compared to the FTAs in Thailand, the Maldives or even in Singapore. With a black swan event like the twenty-first century COVID-19 pandemic, many countries focus on domestic travellers, so does India. Just before the pandemic, several plans and policies encouraging domestic travel made their way along with the promotion of quality tourism globally with a lesser number of Overseas Tourism Offices (OTO). The Federal Government in India, in a strategic manner, ensured that domestic travel and FTAs would happen in tandem. It was done through robust global tourism promotion through the India Missions and OTOs that ensured a positive growth trajectory and the metrics that provided the ammunition for economic growth. The research team also got to interview former officers of the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India and players from the private sector that have played a role in the sectoral business operations.

Call it the curse, the myth, the legend, the dacoits, the flora and fauna, the River, and the valley remains untouched and pristine and is home to many endemic species and is blessed with stark but beautiful landscape, the surreal world of an era gone by, the ravage of the ravines, which have been preserved, protected, and conserved, albeit for the ‘ancient curses,’ and yes being a home to the ‘dreaded outlaws’ and ‘modern dacoits.’ Whether it was the fear for one’s life considering it was a dacoit area or also known as ‘gun powder area,’ or the curses that none wanted to garner to themselves, Chambal is slowly but steadily ebbing out of the dark shadows that it once was. The river itself passes through Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh, before joining the river Yamuna. Declared a Protected Area (PA) in 1978, the nomenclature of dark tourism will be ubiquitous to the Chambal River valley, considering that the area is dotted by a multitude of forts, and heritage destinations, that have frozen in the sands of time; either on account of the stories that meander, as the river does, with its deep ravines, ravines that invite the adventurer. It is the last bastion for the nation’s endangered wildlife, viz., Gharial, Maggar, Turtles, Otter, and the fresh water Dolphin, which has encouraged the Government to get the local community to be part of the special purpose vehicle promoting tourism. The authors known for their contribution to community-based ecotourism (CBE) have visited the Chambal area and worked with the communities and bureaucracy to ensure conclusions.