Managing Tourism in Auroville

The number of foreign and domestic tourists in India is steadily increasing. According to a recent report in The Hindu, in 2017 Tamil Nadu was the most popular state for domestic tourism, and the second most popular destination for foreign tourists. In all, it received over eight million visitors that year.

Sometimes, it feels as if most of them are coming here. In 2016, the Auroville Visitors Center logged 637,961 visitors, and this rose to 714,000 in 2017. Most of these were day-tourists, intent upon seeing the ‘golden globe’. And, indeed, the Matrimandir remains the magnet for the vast majority of casual visitors. But visitors also include longer-stay guests as well as volunteers, many of whom contribute valuable energy and ideas to the community.

Aurovilians’ attitudes to visitors, particularly the day visitors, are mixed. Some see them as a useful source of revenue, others as disruptors of our daily lives and threats to our essential values. But two things are clear. Firstly, tourism to Auroville will continue to grow, particularly as the Matrimandir is actively promoted as a tourist attraction by India and Pondicherry tourist authorities, and this will put increasing pressure upon our roads, resources and way of life. Secondly, the community has no policy or plans about how to deal with tourists. Tourism ‘happened’ to Auroville: it was never planned.

It was in this context that Aurovilian planner Lalit invited postgraduate students from the Urban and Regional Planning School of Queen’s University, Canada, to make a study of tourism in Auroville and to suggest a framework to manage tourism impacts in Auroville and its Greenbelt.

The students spent several months doing preparation work in Canada. They studied documentation on tourism and on Auroville, explored best practices regarding tourism management in other parts of the world and engaged in Skype conversations with Aurovilians. From the information they received, they concluded that day-trippers are the cause of most of our tourism-related impacts; that Auroville is more welcoming to long-term visitors because they gain exposure to Auroville by learning from and contributing to the community; and that the surrounding Greenbelt villages are fast developing tourism infrastructure because of a relative lack of infrastructure in Auroville itself. The students also did a preliminary SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis of tourism in Auroville and suggested a list of possible management tools.

However, when they arrived in Auroville in early December they realized that nothing had prepared them for the ground reality. “We thought we had understood the situation when we were in Kingston but when we were on the ground our perspective completely changed,” says Natalie, one of the students. “One thing we learned about Auroville is you can’t really compare it to anywhere else. The plans and priorities of all these other places we studied beforehand are very different from Auroville. I think that in our preparatory work we were just scratching the surface.”

As the students planned to be in Auroville for just two weeks, they decided to focus upon the day-visitors as these were the most numerous and, in some ways, the most problematic in terms of tourism impact. The students conducted audits with these tourists to find out where they were coming from and what they wanted to see.

“We discovered,” says Natalie, “that almost every tourist who came to the Visitors Center was only coming for the day and only wanted to see the Matrimandir. Some had checked the Auroville website before coming, but said the information they gained at the Visitors’ Center was beneficial. Most of those we spoke with seemed satisfied with their visit.”

The students also held interviews and group discussions with villagers from Edayanachavady, the village most affected by tourist traffic as well as with Auroville Village Action Group, the Visitors Center, Security, and the Auroville economy group, as well as with individual Aurovilians.

“The local villagers had a lot of concerns regarding noise pollution and environmental pollution from traffic congestion as almost all the traffic to the Visitors Center passes through their village. Tourism was mainly negative for them. However, we did not have time to speak to villagers who owned guesthouses and restaurants. We gathered that there is a shift in Edayanchavady’s economic base from agriculture to tourism and I think these ‘hospitality’ villagers look at tourism from a different perspective from the Aurovilians. So I think there is a need to develop partnerships, to find ways that work for both parties.

“The Auroville economy group would like tourism to develop in Auroville but to find a better way to incorporate it for its economic benefits, while Village Action emphasised the need for more collaboration between the Aurovilians and the villagers in managing tourism. As for individual Aurovilians, some love the tourists and think tourism is a huge opportunity for Auroville, but others do not want tourists at all.

Generally, however, we gathered that many Aurovilians want a shift from ‘consumeristic’ tourists to those who want to participate and give back to the community as much as they take away. Finding out how to manage this transition is perhaps the biggest challenge today.”

As to the larger regional perspective, the students learned that Pondicherry tourism is promoting Auroville as a tourist site. However, it provides little information and many tourists arrive without being prepared for Auroville or understanding the significance of the Matrimandir. While information is available at the Visitors Center, a substantial number of short-term visitors leave Auroville with little understanding of the ethos or purpose of this place. Moreover, there is a lack of opportunities for day visitors to engage with Auroville in any way except for a visit to the viewing point of the Matrimandir.

On the conclusion of their research, the students summarised the main concerns they had heard as unmanaged regional, state and private promotion of Auroville tourism; traffic congestion; security issues; unplanned tourist-related development in the neighbouring villages; Auroville being viewed primarily as a tourist attraction rather than a place for learning; and the lack of a unified response to tourism in the community.

In their final presentation to the community, the students noted once again the negative impacts of tourism – disruption of daily life, traffic congestion, pressure on the community’s infrastructure etc. – but they also emphasised the potential positives of managed tourism. These include economic benefits to the community (in November alone, the Visitors Center parking fee generated Rs 2,152,050 while in the same month 50 Auroville guesthouses and 31 home stays generated Rs 8,542,670), and increased employment opportunities and learning exchanges.

The students made a number of recommendations to help Auroville manage tourism in such a way that it would benefit both the community and its neighbours (see box). Short-term recommendations included decongesting visitor traffic flow through Edayanchavady by creating new parking on the periphery of the Auroville township and providing a walkway and/or electrical shuttle service to the Visitors Center; and a certification system for tour guides/operators and guesthouses in Auroville and the villages to ensure that certain standards are achieved and maintained.

They also suggested providing introductory tours of Auroville. “Auroville has so much more to offer than just the Matrimandir,” observed Natalie. “If Auroville would be willing to share more of these other activities, visitors would have a richer and more complete experience. Of course, one needs to find the fine line between providing these opportunities and preventing disruption in the community and invasions of personal space.”

Longer-term recommendations included collecting data related to tourism (through visitors’ audits, economic impact assessment, amenity checklist etc.); determining Auroville’s tourism carrying capacity in terms of its existing infrastructure and resources; collaborating with the nearby villages on tourism-related development; and establishing a regional planning approach with the Pondicherry tourist authorities. As Natalie put it, “Pondicherry is promoting Auroville as a tourist location, so the community should have a stake in that conversation to ensure that the correct information is conveyed.”

Most fundamentally, the students felt that the community needs to develop a unified response to tourism. As a first step, they suggested that residents engage in a community visioning workshop on tourism. They also proposed that an Auroville tourism working group be formed to collect data, undertake discussions with all stakeholders and, finally, implement a tourism impact management plan.

Their concluding thought was that, in terms of managing tourism in Auroville, there is a need for improved communication, collaboration and knowledge sharing with all interested and affected parties both inside and outside Auroville, and a bottom-up approach to the implementation of any management plan.

The students’ final presentation was well received. It was remarkable how much they had absorbed and understood during their two weeks’ stay, and many of their recommendations will remain relevant for years to come.