Feed your mind

India, prepare for foreign students swarming into the country on study tours.

Not so long ago, India was rated highly in some parts of the world as a good place to learn how to wobble your head. Now, it's about what to stuff your head with to sharpen the mind.

An incipient sign: international universities are getting interested in India as a learning ground for its students. As we write, a group of students from the Michigan State University's (MSU) international lodging development and management course are on an educational trip to India.

And if you think lodging properties are not subjects worthy enough of academic attention, think again. The group will spend three weeks in India, and will tour Jaipur, Ajmer, Deogarh, Devigarh, Udaipur, Manali, Shimla and Agra, all places where a stay can be a "value added" experience if you're looked after well.

In Manali, for example, the group wiall study Alfred Ford's upcoming Himalayan Ski Village project "" the study of which will qualify students for curriculum credits.

"The market for educational trips is growing," says Arjun Sharma, managing director, Le Passage, owner of Go India Journeys which organises MSU's tour as an annual event now.

It gets a total of about 600-700 students overall every year, and this is just the start. For 2007-2008, it might get as many as 2,000 students.

SITA, the other big inbound tour operator, also gets some business from UK, US and European students. The schools from the UK, says Himmat Anand, COO, India & South Asia, SITA Incoming, are especially interested in interaction with Indian schools.

Universities, on the other hand, are more inclined towards lectures on specific topics. SITA has earlier handled student groups with interests varying in a wide range from medical practice and insurance business to NGO activity and rural programmes.

Eco-tourism is very popular among tourists on learning trips, according to Mandip Singh Soin, managing director, Ibex Expeditions, a tour operator that focuses on environment tours.

On the whole, the students form an incoming segment of barely 1 per cent of the overall business, but it's mainly about potential. And so even in terms of the students' countries of origin.

"Till now," says Sharma, "India has only looked at the UK, US and some European countries as markets. There are opportunities in other countries which we need to explore."

Of course, for students interested in the finer details of caves, paintings and monuments, one would need specialised guides who can act as quasi-professors.

"What we do is to take the help of experienced university lecturers," says Soin. A system of student volunteers would help too. On this, there's hope. Sharma says that several Indian institutes are responding to the operators' requests for help in hosting study groups knowledgeably.