GB hospitality industry, like locals, waits for improvement

Gilgit-Baltistan Chief Minister Mehdi Shah had recently blamed the media for creating unrest in the region and said that they were bent on ruining Gilgit-Baltistan’s lone industry – tourism. Turns out, tourism is yet another casualty of the landslide lake that has already robbed thousands of people of their land, property and businesses.

“The fear of the lake bursting its banks has become one of the major reasons why tourists are avoiding visiting the scenic valleys of Gilgit-Baltistan (GB). There is a dominant perception among the people in the southern areas of the country that the people of GB are sitting atop a ticking bomb that is set to explode anytime,” the manager of a private transport company told The Express Tribune.

Although there are no official statistics of the total number of tourists that visited the region this year, sources said that the figure was too low to be compared with the statistics of last year. Several tourist resorts in Gilgit and Hunza are lying vacant but the situation in Skardu is comparatively better.

A number of people in Gilgit-Baltistan are attached to the tourism industry. The total number of private hotels exceeds 200 across Gilgit-Baltistan and people coming from Hunza and Gojal said that almost all the hotels occupied previously by tourists were empty this summer. An official of the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation’s office in Gilgit said that all ten motels operated by the corporation in Gilgit-Baltistan were low on business.

The manager said that last summer, his company, which operates a bus service to Gilgit from Rawalpindi, had enjoyed good business despite the fact that it takes 21 hours to travel between the two cities by road. “[Now], we are asked in Rawalpindi when the crisis triggered by the landslide lake will settle. And we have no answer for it,” he said.

The region was cut off primarily because last month, the threat of flash floods was looming over the Karakoram Highway that runs alongside the Gilgit River. The 805-kilometre-long highway, which is the route of choice between Rawalpindi and Gilgit, was declared unsafe for travel from Hunza to Gilgit.

Rehmat Nabi, another tour operater in Gilgit, said that he suffered a drastic decline in his business this year compared to last year. “In 2009, I had entertained around 3,000 tourists. This year, business is down by almost 90 per cent,” he said.

A massive landslide had blocked the Hunza River in January, creating a 24-kilometre-long lake that has so far submerged at least four villages upstream. Thousands of people were forced to flee from their homes and were moved to camps set up by the government in areas considered safer. Another 25,000 people have been evacuated from villages downstream that face the risk of inundation if the lake bursts.

In May, a spillway was built by engineers of the Frontier Works Organisation and the lake was expected to drain by June, but three huge boulders are blocking the spillway and thus the water’s release. Following pressure from the locals, who last week took matters in their own hands and tried to repair the spillway, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) agreed on Sunday to use explosives to blast the boulders.

Meanwhile, NDMA sources said that the boulders would most likely be demolished today (Tuesday). Hunza district commissioner Zafar Waqar Taj said that water discharge recorded on Monday was 8,752 cusecs while inflow was 8,300 cusecs. He said that the lake’s level also rose by almost 10 inches. Deputy speaker of the Gilgit-Baltistan Legislative Assembly Jamil Ahmad has said that the government was prepared to meet any eventuality and water exodus from the spillway was according to plan. (With additional input from APP)

Published in The Express Tribune, June 22^nd, 2010.