Kill the patent

Taschen's The Hotel Book, Great Escapes Asia is one of those tomes that makes you want to pack your bags instantly and go away on holiday to some remote isle.

Yet this is no backpacker's guide "" on the contrary, you need to be able to spend lavishly to afford the resorts that feature in this stunning book on some of the best hotels in this continent.

Generously, the book has 14 inclusions from India "" the largest number from any country; Indonesia, at second place, has only nine "" and there are no representations from Singapore and Hong Kong.

That may be because the book does not look at spectacular hotels but at resorts that are part of their environment. Whether by the sea, in hill resorts or forest retreats, their proximity to the soul of each place characterises them.

The absence of air-conditioning, of five-star excellence, does not deter from the rootedness of each resort in the local cultural and ecological idiom.

While the Indian selection has most entries from Rajasthan and Kerala respectively, the surprises lie in the choices "" the exclusion, for example, of the brilliant Vilas properties in favour of the more earthy Bhanwar Niwas (in Bikaner), or Nilaya Hermitage (in Goa) or Green Magic Nature Resort (in Kerala).

The choices may have been difficult to make, but they make a point: what is it that tourists (especially leisure tourists in leisure destinations as opposed to business travellers in urban locations) look for? And, in another context, what do hotel builders or contractors aim for when designing a hotel in, say, a forest reserve?

An interesting case in point is Shivpuri National Park in Madhya Pradesh.

While there is a beautifully designed (but poorly maintained) tourist resort of the Madhya Pradesh state tourism development corporation, spread out along the banks of the lake, newer hotels have hoardings advertising "Delhi-style" hotels, indicative of the shoebox structure that has become the model for most mid-range hotels in small towns around the country.

To go to Audhi, for example, outside Udaipur, and find a stark white concrete structure with bay-windows masquerading as a hotel is offensive to its immediate environment (so much better captured by another neighbour in the exposed stone finish of its facade).

From hill-stations to beaches, the "Delhi-style" hotel is the greatest failure of our tourism authorities who busy themselves with "authorising" stars for hotels based on carpeting in corridors and such.

Today, tourism authorities must concern themselves more with packaging resort construction that is designed to blend and enhance the local topographic experience.

Therefore, what is required "" and urgently "" is some kind of regulatory authority that approves plans for hotels and resorts on some basis of local contiguity. This need not apply to city or large hotels, but is pivotal where resorts in tucked-away locations are concerned.

And while any regulation in this country becomes a baton for extortionism, the hospitality industry "" and millions of travellers "" should only be grateful for providing the ambience and organic resorts of the kind featured in The Hotel Book.