Srinagar, Apr 1: While 2,08,798 people visited the scenic Tulip Garden located close to Dal Lake during the last 10 days, number of visitors to the garden is set to break the previous records soon.
The rush of visitors and many locals to Asia’s largest Tulip garden this year, ever since it was thrown open to public on March 23, to witness more than a million Tulips bloom is the highest in the last few years.
Director Floriculture, Farooq Ahmad Rather told Greater Kashmir that more than 30,000 people visited the garden on Friday taking the total visitor footfall of the last ten days to 2 lakh plus.
As per official statistics, 1.50 lakh footfall was registered at the Tulip garden during 2017 Tulip season, in 2018 the number was 1.83 lakh while in 2019 it was around 2.10 lakh. In 2020, the garden could not be thrown open to the public due to COVID. Similarly, last year also COVID proved to be a dampener. However, this year the garden has already witnessed 2 lakh visitors in the first 10 days after the opening, officials said.
Speaking with Greater Kashmir, Secretary Tourism, Sarmad Hafiz said with summer vacations beginning in many outside states, visitor arrivals are further expected to increase. “With robust promotion of the garden, we expect the footfalls to further increase as the garden is being kept open till maximum period in April. Whether garden will be then kept open for few more days depends on the weather conditions and the bloom,” said Hafiz.
Among tourists visiting the Tulip garden to get mesmerized by the 50 varieties of 1.5 million Tulips spread over 360 kanals of land includes those from Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, north India and several southern states, the official informed. Besides, a large number of locals are also visiting the Tulip garden, he said.
“A large number of visitors from Thailand and Malaysia are also likely to visit the garden which sends across a positive message globally. People of all age groups indulge in clicking selfies and take back colourful memories from here,” Hafeez said. Tourism players have also expressed optimism over the increased influx of people visiting the Tulip Garden. They said the main aim of the garden is to prepone the tourist season of Kashmir from May to April which helps the tourism sector. “The response has been overwhelming from both locals and tourists and we hope the footfalls become better in days to come. A complete care is taken about the comfort and convenience of visitors coming to the garden,” said Hafeez.
In order to woo more tourists, a food festival was organised at the garden during the last few days. Illumination of the Tulip Garden helping to attract tourists to Tulip garden during evening hours has also been a success, officials said. The Tulip garden has 360 kanals under floriculture activities with Tulip as a major crop growing on seven hectares of land. In addition to Tulips, other bulbous material grown in the garden includes Hyacinths, Narcissus, Daffodils, Muscaria and Iris.