One morning in Pelling, when we were on our way back from a walk, we saw a curious sight. A motley crowd of people was gathered in the tiny market square, and jute bags were being distributed all around. Given that the town was sleepy even during the day, we wondered what was happening so early in the morning. “It’s World Tourism Day,” said one of the organisers, “and we are celebrating it by distributing jute garbage bags to taxi drivers, so they can collect all the garbage that tourists throw on the hills, and bring it back for proper disposal…”
This had to be one of the more eco-sensitive ways of observing World Tourism Day, I thought. As we watched, members of Pelling Tourist Development Association (PTDA), an NGO that aims to promote sustainable tourism in the region, spoke to the assembled cabbies: “All of us are very conscious about where we throw garbage, and we also have an adequate garbage disposal system in our town,” they said. The problem, said they, were tourists. Locals followed the plastic bag ban in the state religiously, but tourists didn’t — throwing tetra packs of juice and empty chips packets out of car windows while sight seeing. “These plastic bags and juice packets,” they explained to the cabbies, “will pollute our mountains for hundreds of years.” The taxi drivers could play an important role by cleaning up after tourists.
“Every year we get between 80,000 to a lakh tourists in Pelling,” said Tshering Wangdi Bhutia, secretary of PTDA. While this is good for the economy of the little town, it has meant a steady degradation of local ecology, said he. “Fifteen years ago, when I was growing up here, Pelling consisted of about three houses. Today, over eighty hotels operate here…” said he. Obviously, this sudden expansion has taken its toll on civic amenities and natural resources of the area. One of the issues PTDA has raised with the help of the Zila Panchayat is that the town needs a garbage recycling plant desperately. “We have also successfully raised concerns about the visual pollution that electricity wires caused in Pelling,” said Wangdi, “as we found that the town’s fantastic mountain views were being obscured by their unsightly presence.” As a result of their campaign, today, all electricity wires in Pelling have been laid underground, and hopefully telephone wires will follow suit. They’ve also planted trees and bushes, not just in Pelling, but in the jungles as well. “Forests can degenerate rapidly when there’s unplanned development, and we’d like to put the brakes on that,” said Wangdi.
Interestingly, Wangdi and some of the other members of PTDA, are hoteliers themselves. “Obviously, getting more tourists in Pelling does mean better business for us,” said he. The NGO supports the state tourism departments in promoting festivals in the winter. “Although our winter is beautiful, it is a lean season for tourists,” said Wangdi. So they are working to publicise the Kanchenjunga festival every December, to make it a tourist draw. Sikkim also has a host of other festivals in January and February, and Wangdi and other hoteliers would dearly like to prolong the winter season by promoting them as well.
Wandgi looked at a hoary old pine nearby, gnarled trunk weathered with age, bursting with myriad creepers, orchids and other flora. “This tree is older than you and I,” said he, “it supports so many other life forms, and yet has lived to this magnificent age. I’d like to see Pelling like this — proud to be one of India’s three ecological hotspots, and unchanged by all the tourists who come to admire its beauty…”