Over the past decade or so, India has uncovered its hidden jewels: little erstwhile principalities airing their old havelis and forts out, to have them recreated to part-former-glory, part-modern-luxury. They give employment to the local population, while offering the tourist a glimpse of what we believe was pre-Raj elegance.
“But step outside and reality will hit you. There’s abject poverty, women still walk for miles to get water, and it’s possible that the owner of the property himself is struggling to make ends meet, so he really has little time for community development,” says Mumbai-based Rashmi Sawant, who started Culture Aangan Tourism in 2010. Her aim was to help people understand the nuances of living in a village—on the outside of the ‘big house’.
She began the company as a venture to help her daughters understand village-life basics. She covers three villages. Fancy learning block printing and spending time with camel herders in Pali, Rajasthan? You’re unlikely to find a single tour operator offering more than 10-15 villages, because these aren’t just tie-ups—they are researched and carefully-crafted experiences.
Glocally speaking
Just a few months ago, Airbnb, in a tie-up with SEWA, the self-employed women’s union, put 10 villages in three districts of Gujarat on the travellers’ map. The response has been surprisingly good, says Reema Nanavaty, who heads SEWA. Surprising, not because it’s popular, but because there are a greater number of tourists from India than those from abroad.
What is rural tourism then, beyond living in a village in the home of a potter, a weaver, a fisherman or a farmer? “It’s about hospitality from the heart. The people make the place and most of India’s people are still in its villages,” says Mumbai-based Inir Pinheiro, who founded Grassroutes in 2009, and now hosts people in 12 villages across different experiences, including the million fireflies festival experience in Purushwadi and Vanjulshet, in Maharashtra, and the walk with the guardians of the tigers in villages in the Pench tiger reserve, Madhya Pradesh.
Most of the villagers continue to live in their original dwellings, and simply make space or build a few more rooms in a similar format to what already exists. In fact, Shikha Tripathi, who started One Planet Journeys that has evolved into a foundation working on tourism and education, in the Kumaon region of Uttarakhand, says that she does not take on houses where the villagers construct modern structures. Her “culture hikes” meander through villages, introducing you to Nature and the people, as you stay nights at villages along the way.
Experiences aplenty
Village homestays have the basics and a visitor is welcome to share the home—sit in the kitchen to watch food being cooked over a wood fire and share a meal around it, or accompany a farmer to the fields for the day’s harvest. Obviously, there are no ‘extras’.
“This is not a touristy experience. It is real exposure to rural India; it’s where we came from,” says Nanavaty. Depending on your interest, your village-tour operator will help you pick a place. To experience the starkness of a salt desert in the Rann of Kutch, Gauriben’s homestay gives you the chance to (through Airbnb-SEWA). Plus, you can participate in housework in the village and watch women engage in embroidery. It’s not everybody’s cup of tea—there’s no air-conditioning; there may not be running water; there may only be Indian-style loos. It is for the traveller, not the holiday-seeker, because this isn’t a rustic-themed adventure or staged authenticity, as Chandni Aggarwal, who started Rural Odyssey last year, calls it. Her tips: You must crave (not just like) Nature, culture and knowledge; take more than a two-night-three-day ‘package’, leave the mobile phone and the eternal search for WiFi behind. One of her favourites is Kisama, where she takes people during the Hornbill Festival that brings together 16 Naga tribes.
“This sort of tourism helps create a dialogue, and both the host and the guest benefit,” says Anand Sankar, a photo-journalist from the South, who visited Kalap in the Garhwal region in Uttarakhand once and then gradually moved his life to the hills, starting the Kalap Trust in 2014. “The extra income gives people access to education and health.” His organisation has made a commitment of bringing in guests to those households that build a toilet. “A couple of years ago, there were about three or four in the village; today, there are 20,” he says. He does treks through the region, with halts at Kalap and Saur. Because there is demand, he will expand to 35 places in a few months’ time.
Most tour guides help urbanites make the transition to the village with a few handy tips. If the hosts are vegetarian, don’t drink and like to sleep by 9 pm, it’s respectful to follow their lead. Tripathi follows the LNT (leave no trace) policy, where you don’t leave behind any trash whatsoever—not even a plastic bottle, and you pick up nothing from where you go—not even a pebble from the forest. It’s a matter of respect.
