By: Satyakam Bharti
Beti Anmole Hai – 30% more than the betaa. That’s the premium the Himachal Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation has set on the girl child. So anyone accompanied by a beti to an HPTDC hotel can have a discount of 30% on stay there. Now how and why this figure was arrived at is immaterial; what matters is – Beti Anmole Hai. Of course every loving parents realise it, even without the 30% cut, and may therefore choose a fresh-air resort over a damp sarkari accommodation. And those caught in vices like ‘male bias’ may be too busy lamenting a girl child or even feeding her to be able to take the beti on a holiday, that too an expensive one.
Whatever the motive behind the discount move – public awareness or public gimmick – HPTDC has at least managed to invent another branch of tourism. The package deal can be termed gender sensitivity tour. If not Himachalis, at least, beti-loving people from the neighboring plains would definitely flock to the hills, which they already do. But if not their own state governments, let the Himachal government reward them for not having killed the beti in the womb. And not that in the hills there are no such killers or those who confine their paraya dhan in four walls before handing them over to the rightful owners. They actually have hardly any resources to dine in HPTDC hotels.
Himachal has been lucky not to have dug up the backyard of a nursing home to stumble upon hundreds of foetuses, but there’s no guarantee. With a sex ration going down and down, there’s every possibility of foetus killing fields within the state and the slaughter houses in neighboring states are of course there.
The month-long special campaign from July 15 to August 15 with a view to improve the declining sex ratio in the state is appreciable, but what beyond that. The state government claims to have implementing various schemes to improve the sex ratio, such as incentives to the panchayats in which the sex ratio was the best and also individuals who opt for family planning after one or two girl children. Education of a girl child is already free in the state. Despite all these incentives, there has not been much improvement at the ground level. Last year the then Union women and child development minister had launched the ambitious ‘Conditional cash Transfer for Girl Child with Insurance Cover (CCT)’ scheme, but results are hard to come.
The problem being our patriarchal thinking, which discriminates against the female sex at every level. Awareness in the only solution that we can think of as any amount of forced monitoring has not yielded results, and therefore HPTDC may not be too off the mark. In a welfare state everybody is entitled to a free lunch. So what if it is at an HPTDC hotel.
Bharti ji
You are reading too much into the whole affair. This year HPTDC has not announced any off season discount during the monsoon season. The same discount is being offered from Sept 1 – Sept 10 in the grab of Beti Anmol Hai catch line.
Strange are the ways of HPTDC, if one reserves online on there website then no discount is offered but just walk across any HPTDC hotels and the managers are too eager to oblige with a discount. I guess HPTDC have not still heard the word 'malpractise'.
Hi dear i am nt surprised on ur criticism, but there are sme thngs tht shld be appreciated, whehter they are complete or no, beyond the politics, so shldnt we appreciate it not jst for political sake , bt fr right cause…..dont we?????
Still it is a good incentive to mould the mindset of the people in the right direction. Those going for online booking should not rue their decision but should appreciate the move.
HPTDC scheme is more on the lines of generating awareness rather then pushing for cash discounts. So even I will go with aarkay that this is a good incentive.
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