Two high-profile and multi-crore weddings last week were to have been the Jammu and Kashmir Tourism Department’s showcase, signature events aimed at attracting the high-value wedding tourism to the State. Both however, were overshadowed by the weeklong turmoil and street protests in the Valley.
In a first of its kind, a Gauri business family from Indore had booked the entire five-star Khyber Himalayan Resorts in Gulmarg, besides four other hotels at the tourist destination, located at an altitude of 8,000 feet, with snow-capped mountains all around, for around 300 guests.
Special rides on the Gulmarg Gondola, Asia’s highest cable car, took the guests further to Affarwat at a height of 13,780 feet for a breathtaking view of Srinagar. Sources said Rs. 6 lakh were spent on the Gondola tickets alone.
“This wedding was first of its kind at Gulmarg. It’s the State tourism department’s first attempt to sell J&K as a wedding destination on the lines of Singapore and Switzerland. It would have been a showpiece event but for the turmoil. Still these weddings carry the message that despite the conflict, weddings of this scale can take place peacefully. We believe Kashmir has potential to cater to the country’s growing wedding market,” Deputy Director Tourism Peerzada Zahoor told The Hindu .
Sources said the bride and the groom were flown in on chartered flights to Srinagar. The Tourism Department made special arrangements to ensure that the guests safely reached Gulmarg, 60 km from Srinagar airport on April 16, even as the streets were roiling in anger across the Valley. Police sources said special arrangements were made for the security of the guests.
200 guestsCelebrating another wedding, a Malhotra family from Delhi had booked the entire five-star Taj Vivanta for 200 guests. “The wedding was performed on Monday and all the guests were able to go for sightseeing as normality returned in Srinagar,” said a Tourism Department official.
