Aiming for Chinese tourists, guided by Mandarin hurdle
NEWDELHI:The I don’t have enough number of people (authorised tourist guides) who speak Mandarin; we need to address the issue KJ ALPHONS, minister of state (independent charge) for tourism
tourism ministry’s ambitious plan to substantially increase the inflow of Chinese tourists into India from the current number of around 120,000 has run into a strange barrier: India has only 37 authorised guides conversant in Mandarin.
Acknowledging the challenge, KJ Alphons, minister of state for tourism, who recently visited China to woo tourists, said, “I don’t have enough number of people who speak Mandarin and we need to address the problem.”
The Indian Tour Operators Association (ITOA), Tourist Guide Federation Of India (TGFI), senior officials from the ministry , all agree that India’s supply of Mandarin guides falls way short of the required strength.
Over the years, Chinese tourists have become an economic force all around the world. In 2017, 100 million Chinese made overseas trips as tourists according to the website of the country’s ministry of tourism. India receives a fraction of this.
Indeed, including business travellers, India receives only 250,000 Chinese visitors on an average a year, around 2.7% of the total visitors it receives.
Most Chinese tourists do not speak English. Tour operators who exclusively deal with Chinese tourists say that the crisis of Mandarin guides is most evident during Chinese New Year which falls in the first quarter of the calendar year.
Arun Anand, a veteran tour operator with offices in China and India, says that operators have no option but to hire unauthorised guides.
According to tour operators, besides 37 licensed guides, there are around 300 guides conversant in Mandarin. The latter don’t fulfil the tourism ministry’s criteria to obtain a licence.
While the licensed guides have the authority to enter all monuments, including those regulated by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), unauthorised guides can take the visitors to markets and other unregulated destinations.
“Most of these unauthorised guides are not graduates , so they can’t sit for the written test conducted by the ministry. They have only done short duration crash courses to speak Chinese,” says Chander Mohan Luthra, an authorised Mandarin guide who has been working for past 10 years.
He alleges that these guides are not professionally trained and bring disrepute to the profession.
“Chinese pronunciation is extremely difficult. A minor variation in pronunciation can convey an altogether different meaning which sometimes hurt the sentiments of the tourists,” adds Luthra.
However, some tour operators say that some of the unauthorised guides are good enough to fill the vacuum during peak season.
“They are as good as the licensed ones but either they don’t have the required qualification or sometimes are not interested in getting their license renewed,” says Anand who has been running his company since 1991.
People familiar with the language say Mandarin is difficult to master and that the process could take six to seven years. Besides, Chinese tourists invariably visit India only during the Chinese New year holidays, which means that a Mandarin guide may not find employment at other times of the year.
Alphons admitted that learning Mandarin is difficult and has suggested that Indian tour operators should look to hire prople proficient in the language from other countries and train them.
“Let them come to India and be our guides,” says Alphons adding that the stature of a guide should be raised so that more and more people get attracted to join the profession.
Meanwhile, Indian institutions “should start a lot more courses in Mandarin as there is an incredible possibility of employment in this sector,” he added.