Lahaul-Spiti administration works to improve tourism

Abhinav Vashisht

Kullu, April 21

The Lahaul and Spiti district administration is improving facilities and infrastructure to facilitate tourists and promote eco-friendly sustainable tourism in the area.

The administration had ordered 50 prefabricated toilets with bio-digesters at a cost of Rs 43 lakh and the first lot of 24 arrived at Sissu recently. Lahaul and Spiti Deputy Commissioner Pankaj Rai said that 10 of the 20 dumpers provided by the Shimla Municipal Corporation were placed at tourist hotspots yesterday. He added that 11 locations, including tourist places such as Sissu, Udaipur, Triloknath, Tandi Sangam, Deepaktaal and Chandertaal, had been identified and prefabricated toilets would be installed there.

Rai said that one vehicle would collect dry waste from these dumpers and bring it to the material recovery facility site at Sissu and from there it would be sent to the ACC cement plant at Barmana. He added that due to the increasing number of tourists and the commencement of many business activities, pro-active measures were necessary to ensure the proper disposal of dry waste so that the pristine ecology of the area was not polluted. Residents used wet waste to feed livestock or as fertiliser.

Rai said that people were being apprised about the necessity to dispose of waste properly and solid waste management had been incorporated as a co-cognitive subject in the curriculum of schoolchildren. The region had witnessed the arrival of thousands of tourists from Manali every day after the opening of the Atal Tunnel, boosting the local tourism industry.