Evidence from Kamarpukur, West Bengal, India

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

AN EMPIRICAL STUDY ON RURAL TOURISM GAP ANALYSIS: EVIDENCE FROM KAMARPUKUR, WEST BENGAL, INDIA

Dillip Kumar Das, PhD Department of Tourism Management The University of Burdwan ======ABSTRACT

The rural tourism concept has become one of the vital issues of economic and social benefits to the society. This study identifies the problems and prospects of rural tourism in the state of West Bengal. The primary objectives of this study includes the development and emergence of rural tourism in the state of West Bengal, analyze the tourism gap at Kamarpukur, examine the existing as well as future requirement of tourism infrastructure of Kamarpukur and lastly to promote and market Kamarpukur as an important rural tourism destination in Indian

Scenario. For the fulfillment of the basic objectives, data for the study were collected through field survey. Information about the profile of tourism industry includes – hotels, guest house, number of rooms, number of persons employed etc as well as the profile of the tourists were the main elements of the survey. The collected data has been analyzed using different statistical methods, Wilcoxon Pair Ranked Model used for Gap analysis. The major findings shows that the type of rural tourism infrastructure requirements quality.

Keywords: Rural Tourism; Service Gaps; Infrastructure; Service Excellence

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JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

Introduction

Tourism has now become the largest industry worldwide in terms of employment and gross domestic product. The tourism industry is moving at a rapid pace with changing forms in different parts of the world. West Bengal, in India is a land of splendid destination with rich cultural heritage, historical heritage, flora & fauna, beaches, mountains & wildlife. Tourism has various dimensions in various aspects like socio economic, demographic, technological, geographical, cultural, natural, and many fields. The attractions of tourists have been growing up on the above stated types of dimensions. Tourism now has laid down emphasis on the rural areas. According to Ray and Das 2011 a vast potential to earn foreign exchange and generate employment was recognized. Rural Tourism in West Bengal has a great prospect and also has potentiality for the rural economy. Rural Tourism is highly attractive to both guest and host because they would like participating in rural Culture, share the knowledge, ideas and get maximum recreational satisfaction. In the context of social and economic objectives it is necessary to take vital steps which are constructive and positive. Tourism is also an employment generating sector. There is an opportunity which sullies various services, needed for tourism product may be in the position to open avenues of employment. Its contribution to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 6.0% i.e $67.3 bn in 2009 and is expected to be $ 187.3 bn by 2019.According to the Indian Tourism Forecast (2007-2011) Report in India inbound tourist expenditure per head is third highest in the globe, even more than the global average tourist spending and tourist influx to India is expected to increase at a CAGR of 22.65% between 2007 to 2011. According to the Ministry of Tourism, India during the month of March 2009, Foreign Tourist Arrivals were 472,000and the decline in FTAs may be the reason of economic meltdown. Rural parts generally following kinds of products are available resources viz. historical, heritage, natural based, medication and religious based, cultural based and manmade resources. Which have got a great potential with respect development of tourism, also if certain challenges are removed this could be developed to their fullest excellent and there are certain great examples and certainly few countries where it will be showing public and political will these things have been made possible. In India we observe that there is tourist congestion in urban, religious and

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

sites and simultaneously innumerable tourist sites remain unknown and unnoticed in the rural belts of our country. This paper has observed that a tourist site, which is located in extreme rural area, has come to limelight due to its historical importance or publicity by the local government and they have developed into a tourist village with variety of improvements in tourism amenities, road and rail connection, hospitality and cottage industry. This has in turn bought immense change in the local economy in terms of growth of handicraft industry, employment, life style of the locals etc. We have proceeded in the following manner: Literature Review, Objectives of the study, Methodology, Analysis, Results and Concluding Comments.

Survey of literature:

Tourism studies turned its attention to „alternative‟ forms of tourism, suggesting that these were more likely to overcome the exploitative dimensions of mass tourism in developing countries (Lea 1993; Brohman 1996; Khan 1997). The „pro-poor tourism‟ (T) approach can be seen as an attempt to take these questions into account and to target the benefits of tourism more directly towards poverty reduction (Brown and Hall 2008). According to Negi (1990) the attractions in rural areas are enjoyment of rural scenery, the desire for open space , quiet and piece of mind, rural sports like hunting, fishing, ethnic attractions like folk life, custom, food, drinks, and festivals, educational and historical attractions like castles, churches, temples and monasteries etc. According to Jennet Hanshall (2000) “describes that Rural area is that rural tourism uses the country side as resources, which is associated with the search by urban dweller for tranquility and space for outdoor recreation rather than being specifically liked to nature”. Bramwell & Lane (1994) points out that “Rural tourism is a multifaceted activity. It is not just farm based tourism. It includes farm based holidays but also comprises special interest nature holidays and ecotourism , walking , climbing, riding, adventure, sports & health tourism , hunting, and angling, educational travel ,arts & heritage tourism & in some areas ethnic tourism .”Tourists participate in creation of sales, profits, jobs, returns and income. Tourism is characterized by the fact that consumption takes place where the service is provided (Steenwegen, 2003), and the economic impact of tourism is an important factor of national, regional and public planning and economic development. Focusing on the demand side as several authors have pointed out (Page and Getz 1997, Sharpley and Sharpley 1997), the recent trends in tourism lead to shift from standardized mass tourism to more individualistic patterns, which look for a more meaningful 28

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

experience. In this sense the emergent rural tourist segment has varied motivations, which might include ecological uniqueness, cultural attractions, special adventures opportunities or the peace and quiet of the countryside. This represents a unique opportunity for rural operator, who can established network of different service providers to maximize opportunity and offer a diverse range of activities (Briedenhann and Wickens 2004). In the hospitality industry, several studies have examined tourism attributes that guests may find important when evaluating the performed service quality. Literature review suggests that cleanliness (Atkinson 1988; Knutson 1988; Gundersen, Heide and Olsson 1996), security and safety (Atkinson, 1988; Knutson, 1988; Gundersen et al. 1996), employees‟ empathy and competence (Atkinson 1988; Knutson 1988; Barsky and Labagh 1992; Gundersen, Heide and Olsson 1996; Choi and Chu 2001; Markovi ´c 2004), convenient location (Knutson 1988; Barsky and Labagh 1992), value for money (Atkinson 1988; Gundersen, Heide and Olsson 1996; Choi and Chu 2001) and physical facilities (Choi and Chu 2001; Markovi ´c 2004) are attributes that hotel guests perceive as being important. According to Oliver (1980) the customer satisfaction research literature concerns how well the service delivery occurs in comparison with expectations. Today customer satisfaction is an important subject and is also often discussed in marketing literature. Satisfaction can be described as a number of post experience decisions. One reason for the big interest in this area is that researches believe that customer satisfaction is crucial for all business organization. Researches also argue that satisfaction has positive impact on intention to repurchase. Andreassen T W (2001) mentions that customer satisfaction can be viewed as an evaluation where expectations and actual experience is compared. A service failure is when the service delivery does not manage to meet customer expectations. Often service recovery begins with a customer complaint. The aim with service delivery is to move customers from a state of dissatisfaction to a state of satisfaction. Butcher and Heffernan (2006) discuss the relationship between customer and employees and that social regard plays an important role in service delivery, for example in a situation where a customer has to wait. A number of studies have shown the importance of friendly behavior from the staff in order to improve service delivery and create long term relationships. Grönroos (1983) argues that when the service producer and the service consumer are in direct contact there are many factors that affect the level of satisfaction. In service production there is an extensive involvement of people which creates 29

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

some level of non-standardization that do not exist in production of service. For example, it is difficult for a security brokerage to keep the service quality at the same level when they have thousands of entrepreneurs working out there. There are also a number of communication gaps that can occur between a service company and its customers:  The company overpromises.  A firm fails to stay in touch.  The communication is not understood. The service provider sometimes have more knowledge than the customer and fails to communicate in a way that the customer can understand.  The company does not listen. It happens that customers feel that their instructions to the company are not followed. (Grönroos, 1983). Objectives:

1. To study the rural tourism potentials of west Bengal in general and Kamarpukur in Particular. 2. To analyze the tourism gap at Kamarpukur. 3. To examine the existing as well as future requirement of tourism infrastructure of Kamarpukur. Methodology:

This study is based on both primary data and secondary data. For fulfillment of the objectives this study, observation method and survey method are the technical tools. The instrument of survey included questions on different service satisfaction parameters. Information about the profile of tourism industry includes the tourism units (i.e. hotel, guesthouse, etc.), rooms number, number of local persons engagement, as well as the profile of tourists were the main elements of the survey. The Sample size was restricted to 100 respondents. Researchers distributed questionnaires (consisting 22 statements) (See Annexure 1)to 100 respondents and asked what about your expectations at the first day of visit at Kamarpukur and after three days researchers again distributed those particular respondents to fill same questionnaires to find whether their perceived services are up to the mark to their expectation or not ( See Annexure2). The questionnaire was prepared in Bengali and English because some respondents are not comfortable in English language. The data sources include an integrated household 30

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

questionnaire about socio economic and health status; a survey of village infrastructure; detailed surveys of village infrastructure; detailed survey of private and traditional health facilities available to villagers. The collected data has been analyzed using different statistical methods like percentage; Willcoxon paired ranked model. Sources of secondary data collected were legal documents, local official statistics, reports, articles, and publications, reports of different government bodies and organizations websites.

ABOUT KAMARPUKUR

The Ramakrishna Mission Kamarpukur is the holy birth place of Sri Bhagawan Ramakrishna and the centre was affiliated to the Headquarter of Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission, Belur Math in 1947. Kamarpukur is situated in the extreme West of Arambag Sub-division of Hooghly District, West Bengal in India with Bankura district in the West and Burdwan in the North. It is surrounded by three rivers like the Damodar, the Kansabati and the Darakeswar. Considering its geographical location and historical importance, Kamarpukur has taken a vital position in the road map of rural tourism in West Bengal.

Some Evidences of Rural Tourism Infrastructure at Kamarpukur

Value based courses on India‟s spiritual heritage destinations, yoga, meditation, discourses on the Gita, Upanisad and Scriptures by renowned monks of the Ramakrishna order provided by the ashrama serve as ideal stress busters for the weary travelers looking for some solace. The Kamarpukur branch of Ramakrishna Math and Mission offers truly world class Ayurvedic healing and detoxification packages at its campus. Therapies like Abhayanham, Pizichil, Shirodhara, Shirovasti, etc. are offered. The Ramakrishna Math and Mission, Kamarpukur promotes rural craftsmanship in diverse ways. From running jute spinning mills and manufacturing jute based products to indigenously produce honey. The Mission is always on the lookout for fresh avenues through which the rural folks are empowered. To preserve and promote the rich cultural and spiritual heritage of the nation , Ramakrishna Math carries out various cultural programmes such as folk dance, ballads, jatras (folk theatre) etc, which are mainly performed by the local artists during the celebration of the birth day anniversary of Sri Ramakrishna. Apart from these the birth anniversaries of Holy mother Sarada Devi, Sri 31

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

Ramakrishna Deva and Swami Vivekananda; all monastic disciples of the Master and other world prophets are also celebrated. New Year of Bengali‟s, Durgapuja, Kali puja, Rath Jatra, Holi, Christmas Eve etc. are observed with great festivity.

HYPOTHESIS:

= Ho There is no difference in the overall service satisfaction of tourists’ expectations and perception

H1= There are some reasons of difference in the overall service satisfaction of tourists’ expectations and perception

INTERPRETATION OF HYPOTHESIS:

To test the above Hypothesis statement whether null hypothesis is accepted or rejected, researchers have applied Wilcoxon Signed –Rank Test for Paired Samples through SPSS package.

The test statistics is given by:

T – n (n-1)/4 Z = ------√n (n+1) (2n+1)/24 For a given level of significance ά, the absolute sample Z should be greater than the absolute

Zά /2 to reject the null hypothesis. For a one sided upper tail test the null hypothesis is rejected if the sample Z is greater than Zά and for a one sided lower tail test the null hypothesis is rejected if the sample Z is less than - Zά.

Table: 1 Descriptive Statistics N Mean Std. Minimum Maximum Deviation VAR00001 100 86.5500 4.4571 75.00 98.00 VAR00002 100 85.1200 4.9793 70.00 98.00

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Table 1 depicts about the descriptive statistics of VAR00001 and VAR00002 of 100 numbers of respondents. From this table VAR00001 denotes the before visit at Kamarpukur and VAR00002 denotes the after visit of tourists at Kamarpukur Table: 2 Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test

N Mean Rank Sum of Ranks VAR00002 - Negative Ranks 51(a) 61.37 3130.00 VAR00001 Positive Ranks 49(b) 39.18 1920.00 Ties 0(c) Total 100 a VAR00002 < VAR00001 b VAR00002 > VAR00001 c VAR00001 = VAR00002 The above table denotes test of Wilcoxon Signed Ranks , which depicts that three patterns of ranks (a) Negative ranks which denotes VAR00002 < VAR00001 (b) Positive rank which denotes VAR00002 > VAR00001 and (c) Ties which denotes VAR00001 = VAR00002. There are 51 respondents

Table: 3 Test Statistics VAR00002 - VAR00001 Z -2.085(a) Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) .037 a Based on positive ranks. b Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test In Table 3, the Z value is -2.085 and has a p-value of .037 which is greater than the calculated value 1.96 at 5% level of significance there is no enough evidence to accept the null hypothesis, thereby indicating that there are different aspects which are not up to the mark as tourist‟s demand.

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

Table: 4 Major Problems Encounter for Development of Kamarpukur Tourism

Nature of problems for tourism development No. of respondents agreed

Political 18

Lack of tourism education awareness 27

Terrorism 18

Promotional gap 25

Communication gap 12

Total 100

Source: Based on field survey conducted on December 2011 to March 2012 on 100 respondents

Fig: 1 Comparative Chart of Local Transportations

Source: Local Transportation Authority

Results and Discussions:

From the above analysis the alternative hypothesis has been accepted by rejecting the null hypothesis. The findings of the study have been given below:

JOMASS Volume 1, Issue 1, February 2014 ISSN 2348-6317 © Blue Square Publishing House

 The present study depicts in the point of view of tourism services the infrastructure is quite better but according to respondent‟s car parking infrastructure, it is not satisfactory. They often complained about the parking during the festival.

 According to respondents the entire atmosphere is very peaceful. It is ideal for meditation. The internal infrastructure of rest house should improve as per the opinion of respondents.

 Physical amenities infrastructure point of view according to respondents is satisfied.

 In the context of destination infrastructure, it has been found that transportation cost is comparatively high as per respondents in rural area but moderately chip in urban area. But at the time of festive occasion or off season, motor generated vans demand excessive amount from outside tourists because there is no fixed rate of transportation charge of rickshaws or such motor vans.

 Most of the respondents shared their view in the context of safety of the tourist. Police is sufficient during festive occasion but law and order should be strict enough.

 Local Govt. should look after the trained guide to provide better services to foreign as well as domestic tourists in rural area. But it has been found by field survey that few local untrained women bother tourists and they are not fluent in Hindi or English.

 Another important observation made by the researchers that particularly during rainy season water logging takes place causing the tourists more inconvenient to travel. So effort should be made by the concerned department of the state government to construct good drainage system to get rid of this problem of water logging.

 Another possible gap observed by the researchers is knowledge gap. The result of the differences in managing knowledge and real expectations. This gap can lead to allied different gaps in the process of service quality , caused by: − Lack of market information in terms of supply and demand analysis; − Incorrect interpretations of expected information.

 It is also observed that during any festivals and fairs in this destination, due to the increase inflow of the tourists, the transportation facilities at this destinations is not sufficient to meet the need of the people. As a matter of fact, within a very short span of time, the rickshaw/van pullers and generator operators vans are increasing at an alarming rate causing traffic problem as well as noise pollution (See Figure:1).

 Local artists are also facing numerous other problems. Emergence of agents or middle man is one of them, availability of good raw materials and hike of price of raw materials are also huge problem.

 Another possible gap is the gap of communication arising when there is a difference between the delivered service and the service that the authority promised to the visitors The reasons are: − The planning of communication. − Lack or insufficient coordination between internal staff members; − Organizational performance not in keeping with the specifications, while the communication policy with the market abides by the given specifications

 It has also been found through face to face survey some negative socio economic and cultural impact on tourism in Kamarpukur. Local people complained about the increase of drug addictions in the locality. The price of land also increased after some tourism development. They also expressed their dissatisfaction about highly increase in price of the local food and other items, after the influx of tourist in the locality. Other dominant issue was the presence of Maoism or terrorist activities within the district. There is no such tourism development authority at Kamarpukur. According to the survey 18 persons considered for political problem, 25 persons considered of promotional gap, and 12 persons considered of communication gap between management bodies (See Table:9)

 Few folk lore artists are of the view that due to lack of publicity and advertisement/ promotion, lack of Govt. initiative, the present generations are migrating to other professions. Cultural activities at Kamarpukur are very rich. Enjoyment of rural tourism experience is the second option to the respondents. Popular activities at Kamarpukur like

cycle rides, yoga, bush walking, farm holidaying, bullock cart rides, craft market, fishing, bird watching etc are major source of rural tourist attraction in this area.

Conclusion:

Kamarpukur is having tourism importance and the sites are in ruined condition, so effort should be made both by the Government as well as the Local authority for conservation and preservation of these sites. Establishment of „Tourism Information Centre‟ at the destination and deployment of local educated youths should be trained and hired as guides and stress should be given to those having proper knowledge of Hindi and English to cater the need of the tourists coming from other states as well as countries. The emergence of organizing rural handicraft/ craft mela, Shilpa mela is highly felt to attract domestic tourist in a regular interval thereby attracting repeat visitors as well as showcasing the rural handicraft.

Improvement of transportation facilities and construction of drainage system should be provided by the local government body to avoid inconvenient for the tourist particularly during rainy season.The state tourism department should introduce package tour form Kolkata to Kamarpukur to promote rural tourism in the state and thereby improving the economic condition of the local people by availing the local food and handicraft in the study area. The central government in coordination with the state tourism department should effectively use the Capacity Building for Service Providers Scheme (CBSP) to achieve sustainable tourism development in the place. No doubt the place can be easily developed as a tourism destination but lots of things needs to be done to promote and develop Kamarpukur as a perfect tourism destination in Indian Tourism scenario. Initiatives like adoption of P Model, organizing theme based fairs and festivals, providing guide training program for the local youth etc are some of the few initiatives to develop socio economic life of the local people who are directly or indirectly related to tourism in Kamarpukur.

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