ABSTRACT
Since the launch of the Incredible !ndia campaign in 2002, the Indian government has been making a concerted effort to boost foreign exchange earnings through tourism. Tourism is recognised not just as an engine of growth for India but, in defining the national economic program, the Planning Commission asserted that: “The Tourism and Hospitality sector has a key role to play in promoting faster, sustainable and more inclusive economic growth – the goal of the 12th Five Year Plan” (PC 2011:155). Indeed, the World Travel and Tourism Council (2013) forecasts India’s tourism industry as one of the world’s top five growth areas between 2013 and 2023. Given India’s impressive economic growth trajectory over the last two decades, the question that remains is: To what extent has this growth proven to be more inclusive and sustainable? The Planning Commission of India asserts that tourism is the second largest employment generator for low-skilled and semi-skilled workers in the country, estimating that 78 jobs are created in the tourism sector per million Rupees of investment (PC 2011). In absolute numbers, India’s travel and tourism industry made the world’s highest direct contribution to domestic employment and the second highest total contribution to domestic employment in 2011 (WTTC 2012). Hotels constitute the largest segment of formal employment in the tourism sector. While employment generation is the official justification for the importance given to growth in India’s hotel industry, there is little evidence of any attention paid to the quality of employment that the industry produces. Despite an expansion of the hospitality industry in India, trends in the country and beyond indicate that hotel jobs are very physically and emotionally demanding, not well-paid, and increasingly of a transient and precarious nature (ILO 2001, 2011; Kihç et al. 2011; Watt 2007). Poor employment in tourism is often characterised by the parallel trends of employment of women and migrants on the one hand (Janta et al. 2011; Zampoukos and Ioannides 2011) and low levels of union representation among hotel staff on the other. Taking tourism employment as its point of departure, this chapter is rooted in the normative association of stronger collective representation of workers and higher job quality.
