Goa Tourism COOKIE CRUMBLES as Thomas Cook collapses

PANJIM: Goa Tourism appears to be staring down the barrel as yet another charter tour operator will not ply tourists to the State. British tour operator Thomas Cook has ceased trading and all of its hundreds of thousands of bookings were cancelled after the firm failed to secure rescue funding. 

This is a major setback to Goa as earlier this year, Finnair moved to discontinue its Goa operations. Finnair stopped after 25 years of flying to the State and this will further diminish the number of Scandinavian tourista. It brought two flights a week during season.

Thomas Cook becomes the third setback to the Goan tourism market after 2014-15, when Germany’s Condor, one of the first airlines to start charter operations to the State, discontinued operations citing high cost of operations.

SITA chief executive officer Ernest Dias said there is no link between Thomas Cook India and Thomas Cook UK. “It is the Thomas Cook UK which has gone bankrupt. Thomas Cook India was taken over by a Canadian company called Fairfax,” he told Herald.

However, there would be a huge impact as Thomas Cook UK was flying regularly to Goa. “English clients will be low this year. This is a blow. First, Finnair pulled out last year and now Thomas Cook, it is a double blow to tourism,” he said adding, “I cannot talk about the impact as of now as we are trying some alternative arrangements, but a clear picture would come only after two weeks.”

Goa Tourism Development Corporation managing director Nikhil Desai said Thomas Cook failing is a bad development. “We were looking at a good season and all of a sudden this happens. It is very concerning. This goes to show how fragile the tourism sector has become. We are looking for alternative markets it is likely to affect. Thomas Cook was always full as it was cheap,” he said. 

Travel and Tourism Association of Goa president Savio Messias said that Thomas Cook was plying to Goa for 30 years. “It was a market well organised and settled. Now Thomas Cook had started coming seven days a week plying 300 passengers. This calculates to a void of 45,000 less foreign tourists,” he said.

He stated that Britishers used to come for long stays of 21 days and the tourism industry would feel the loss drastically. “We are trying to make alternative arrangements but we need support from the State and Central government,” he said.