IT’S TOUGH RUNNING A HOTEL IN DARJEELING
Time stands still at Hotel Mount Everest – a mute spectator of Darjeeling’s transformation from a sleepy summer resort to the epicentre of unending political strife. An early 20th century summer residence turned into a hotel, the property was one of the Oberoi Group’s early acquisitions. After being ravaged by fire in the early 1980s, the hotel was shut and hasn’t reopened since. Two years ago, the Oberoi Group sold it, ending decades of failed efforts to rebuild it.
Political unrest in the mid-1980s hobbled work on restoration. Once the dust settled, bargain hunters rushed to Darjeeling to build budget hotels. By the mid-1990s, Hotel Mount Everest was faced with a new problem: acute scarcity of water. The Oberois lobbied successive governments for a fix, but to no avail.
“We tried our best,” says SS Mukherji, vice chairman of EIH Ltd – the company that runs the Oberoi chain of hotels.
Darjeeling is swamped with around 350 hotels and home stays. Water is scarce all year round. All hotels, including premium properties such as Mayfair, have to buy truckloads of water from what is locally known as the “water mafia”.
Even as the Oberois gave up on their sprawling five-acre property, Dilip Ray, a politician and entrepreneur from Bhubaneswar, invested in the hill resort, buying out in 1997 the summer retreat of the royal family of Nazargunj. He has turned the 1875 mansion into a premium hotel with 53 rooms. Ray, who spent his childhood in Darjeeling, runs Mayfair for the sheer joy of fulfilling dreams, “breaking even with tiny margins”.
Lately, he has found company. Harshavardhan Neotia, a leading real estate developer from Kolkata, is building a hotel on the Makaibari tea estate. Neotia’s Ambuja Realty group is building an 80-room boutique hotel at Kurseong to be managed by The Indian Hotels Co. and operated under the Taj brand.
He is pursuing the project for the past seven years, and is undaunted by the frequent disruptions. “Disruptions are unfortunate, but I am sure a political solution will emerge,” says Neotia.