| After the noise dies down, it’s Lakshadweep’s time to shine Hara-kiri. I do a mental kiai every time someone gives me cause to use this term. This time, I wanna thank Mariyam Shiuna, Malsha Shareef and Mahzoom Majid for the opportunity. By launching an entirely unprecedented and entirely unprovoked attack on India’s PM Narendra Modi, these bright minds committed a hara-kiri of tsunamic proportions earlier this week. It was embarrassing to see prominent political figures from the Maldives get their sarongs in a twist after PM Modi posted pics from his visit to the Union Territory of Lakshadweep. It’s noteworthy that nowhere did the PM refer to or bring up the Maldives in his posts. After an X user named Mr Sinha reshared the post, saying that the Union Territory looked ready to compete with the island nation, Rameez, a member of the Progressive Party of Maldives, responded, calling the idea “delusional”. He then went on to suggest that hospitality in India might have a cleanliness problem and that hotel rooms in India might have a “permanent smell”. Shiuna, a deputy minister at the Maldives Ministry of Youth Empowerment, stooped lower than the world’s lowest-lying country when she called the Indian PM “clown” and “puppet of Israel”. Name-calling, are we now, Ms Shiuna? This conduct would be unpardonable anywhere in the modern global arena but displaying such poor civility with the prime minister of a country and a senior statesman is unheard of.  That India is the Maldives’ biggest source market for inbound tourism (with 2.4 lakh and 2.1 lakh Indians holidaying in its islands in 2022 and 2023, respectively) is public knowledge. But it was when I did some number-crunching that I realised that the wave that has risen in the wake of these irresponsible comments by the Maldivian ministers, is enough to cripple the country’s tourist economy, even if briefly. Prominent Bollywood stars and pop culture icons, including Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar, Sachin Tendulkar, Ranveer Singh, John Abraham, among so many others, led a movement urging people to #ExploreIndianIslands. With the cumulative follower count of these influencers standing close to 200 million, the public sentiment predictably got triggered, with cancellations coming thick and fast. Travel operators and aggregators like EaseMyTrip suspended bookings to Maldives. Ever since Covid, upper middle class Indians did find a rather exotic and aspirational destination in the Maldives. So it hurt where it hurts the most. And the last couple of days saw Maldives’ tourist associations doing a double take to douse fires and ‘regret the irresponsible’ statements. And of course the errant ministers got suspended. The cold vibes between the two countries, however, seems no closer to a thaw. But all this isn’t even important. You know what is? When the clamour has died down and another issue to rally emerges in our midst, we must sit down to think. Put our head down and work, for Lakshadweep, the island paradise that we have all gotten behind, needs its own moment under the sun. And for that to happen, infrastructure development is the need of the hour, as is boosting connectivity. For instance, I was gutted to know that there’s only one 70-seater daily flight to Agatti from Kochi, operated by Alliance Air. I was even more gutted to know that the wait to book one, owing to the infrequency, could be well over a month and a half. In our case, we aren’t getting lucky till March. I still remember bookmarking Minicoy for my birthday last year, but I was heartbroken to know that it took 16 hours by ship (the to and fro effectively is 1.3 business days). Less than a third of Lakshadweep’s 36 islands are inhabited currently, and of those that are, the density of establishments offering comfortable or international-standard accommodation is low. In the scenic islands of Suheli and Kadmat, a high-end hospitality chain is expected to come up with two outposts in 2026. While that is an encouraging sign, we must also keep in mind these islands’ unique characteristics in terms of ecosystem and weather, and devise our own tourism model to be proud of. I’m glad it has begun. Reading that tent resorts are in the offing in both Agatti and Kavaratti has been among the best news I’ve read all week. The government is also working on expanding the Agatti airport. To allow it to become a truly world-class beach vacay destination, we must also add strong community engagement, great local transport and spotlight on the inimitable culinary offerings Lakshadweep has to offer to the mix. That, my friends, will be our true redemption. |
