JAIPUR: With its colourful culture and princely past, Rajasthan has been one of the top centres of destination weddings in India for years. But the Covid pandemic has crippled the industry since March 2020. However, now with Covid cases in the desert state declining sharply over past one month, tourism and hospitality sectors are demanding that the government raise the number of people allowed to at a wedding from 50 to 400.
They also argue that neighbouring states such as Gujarat have already raised the number of people attending weddings to 400 due to which the destination business is shifting to Gujarat and other states.
As a result of the Covid curbs in Rajasthan, not only outsiders but even people from the state are going to neighbouring states for weddings. People associated with the weddings industry say that in June-July, over 500 weddings took place in neighbouring states — weddings that were originally slated to be held in Rajasthan. Also, in the upcoming wedding season from Nov to Feb another 2,500 weddings from Rajasthan are likely to be shifted to neighbouring states.
Industry sources say that between Nov and Feb 25,000-30,000 weddings are expected to take place in the state, 10% of which will be of big-budget ones. Each wedding will cost several crores but 50% of the big-budget weddings are estimated to be shifted to other states in case the curbs are not lifted. This will cause a loss of approximately `1,000 to the wedding industry as in some neighbouring states, up to 400 guests are already allowed in weddings.
The upper limit for guests at weddings in other states is much higher than in Rajasthan and ranges from 400 guests in Gujarat, to 200 in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh and is around 100 to 150 guests in Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Delhi, Punjab and Chandigarh. Due to this, a large number of weddings in Rajasthan had shifted away in June-July.