Uttar Pradesh is experiencing a renaissance in religious tourism, evolving from its traditional image as merely a Taj Mahal destination. With significant footfalls in cities like Varanasi, Ayodhya, Prayagraj, and Mathura-Vrindavan, the state is now promoting itself as a hub of spiritual and cultural exploration.

In India, the concept of tourism began with ‘Teerthatan’, where people travelled for religious and spiritual purposes. Indian domestic travel always relied on travel for religious purposes when people travelled for pilgrimages, which is somewhat of a mandatory exercise in Hinduism.

Shared Motivations of Spirituality and Exploration

A cursory analysis of the map of India will show that the entire length and breadth of the country, north to south and east to west, is dotted by important religious sites, encouraging people to cover the entire country. Virtually all religions besides Hinduism propagated travel for pilgrimages, including Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. This kind of travel came so naturally that we seldom considered this form of travel an economic activity. Still, it has always supported economies as a natural benefit and is also the most sustainable and social form of tourism to date, at least in India.

India’s diverse religious sites have catalysed a remarkable rise in spiritual tourism, especially in the post-COVID era, accounting for nearly 60 per cent of domestic travel. According to the Ministry of Tourism’s 2023 statistics, 1,433 million domestic tourists visited pilgrimage sites in 2022, accompanied by 6.64 million international tourists. These numbers show a significant rebound from the pandemic’s lull when domestic spiritual tourism recorded 677 million visitors in 2021 and only 1.05 million in 2020. Globally, religious tourism has also been on the rise—Mecca sees 15.4 million visitors annually, and Saint Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican attracts 6.76 million.

As a welcome surprise, very recently, demographic profiles of travellers for spiritual travel have changed. Where this kind of travel was associated with the aging population, rural population, and most travellers came from not-so-economically well-off backgrounds, now it is the younger lot, urban population, and affluent class choosing to travel on religious tracks.

Growth of Religious Tourism in Uttar Pradesh

In Uttar Pradesh, there is an annual footfall of 540 million in the four religious cities of Varanasi, Ayodhya, Prayagraj, and Mathura-Vrindavan alone. India could see an additional 50 million to 100 million tourists a year on account of the inauguration of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. Add to this the footfall in Prayagraj during Kumbh, which falls once every six years. In 2017, it was 250 million within a limited period of less than two months. In 2025, Prayagraj will yet again be hosting Maha-Kumbh beginning from January 13, 2025, and it is expecting 500 million visitors. Beyond Uttar Pradesh, Tirupati Balaji receives around 50 million tourists annually and is considered a temple with the greatest number of visitors.

Expanding Horizons through Spiritual Tourism

Uttar Pradesh, once primarily recognised for the Taj Mahal in Agra, had long relied heavily on this iconic monument for its tourism industry. This singular focus, however, overlooked the state’s vast potential in other areas. Today, the tourism landscape of Uttar Pradesh has evolved significantly, with a broader emphasis on spiritual tourism destinations. This expansion has revealed the untapped opportunities that could have transformed the state’s tourism profile much earlier.

The State of Uttar Pradesh has been working consistently to leverage the power of tourism by way of four-pronged strategies: identification, planning, time-bound implementation, and quantifiable monitoring. Also, mapping tourism circuits of religious importance in the state was a huge step in this direction. Be it Ramayana, Krishna, Buddha, Jain, or even the great Sufi saints, all were mapped strategically in Uttar Pradesh, with a primary objective to boost the state’s economy through tourism in a time-bound manner.

In 2018 and later in 2022, the Uttar Pradesh government came up with a very futuristic tourism policy that has attracted huge investments in the state, and the state stands out as an example of planned tourism development for many other states of India to take clues from. The policy not only incentivises tourism projects but also pays huge attention to employment generation, participation of women in tourism, skilling youth for tourism, and more. The policy is quite holistic in nature and deals with rural, agricultural, ecological, urban, and adventure tourism in equal measure, confirming the guidelines of responsible tourism. As a result, tourism in Uttar Pradesh is emerging as an economic equaliser, spreading benefits in all regions of the state.

Promoting Spiritual Centres Beyond Religious Identity

With respect to tourism, it will not be justified to only project a destination as just a religious centre, as that only brackets interests and limits the destination’s profile. The best projection of such destinations would be as a ‘Spiritual Centre’ and a ‘Centre of Human Idealism’, unbracketing these from the brackets of religion and resonating with the concept of spiritualism, which is secular in nature, much broader in meaning, and in tune with ‘Sanatan dharma’.

Often, religious destinations in India thrive and focus all their efforts on one main temple or, at the most, a very few countable others. Such a profile of a destination only limits its economic capabilities and diminishes tourism potential. To counter this, it is essential to have early morning and evening activities. These may include some spirituality-related experiences, such as walking tours, story sessions, river entertainment, light and sound shows, live musical and theatrical performances, etc. Overemphasising a single temple visit can diminish a city’s broader appeal and limit the overall time tourists spend there. When a destination offers a variety of attractions and experiences, visitors are more likely to extend their stay beyond their primary reason for visiting, whether it be a shrine visit or a specific activity. This encourages more profound engagement with the destination.

It is also important that we explore, develop, and market the surrounding excursions. Taking an example of Ayodhya, India’s newest destination, the important places around it are Chapiya (30-minute drive), which is the birthplace of Swami Narayan, the deity of Akshardham; then there is Kodar, the birthplace of the father of Yoga, Maharishi Patanjali (40-minute drive); similarly, only 2 hours away from Ayodhya is Maghar, where Saint Kabir’s memorial stands.

Religious Tourism incarnated as Spiritual Tourism, with changed demographics and understanding is all set to leverage the power of tourism in India and the positive effects of the efforts in this direction are quite evident with the state of Uttar Pradesh leading the way.

About the Author: Prateek Hira is the President and CEO of Tornos and heads multiple tour companies in India and internationally. He chairs tourism associations and FICCI’s Tourism Committee in Uttar Pradesh. An accomplished tourism researcher and educator, Prateek sits on the boards of various universities and teaches tourism management at institutions across India and the world.