Assam's Kaziranga National Park Receives Record Footfalls And Revenue This Year

Kaziranga National Park in Assam welcomed nearly 29,000 tourists within a month of reopening on October 1, setting a record for footfalls this year.

Kaziranga:Kaziranga National Park in Assam has achieved a record in footfalls this year. The world heritage site, which is home to the world's highest number of one-horned rhinos, recorded 29,000 tourist footfalls this year. The park was opened for tourists on October 1 this year only and close to 29,000 tourists visited the park within a month that is till November 1, the park officials said.

They further stated that only three ranges of the park--Central Range (Kahara), Burhachapori Range and Bagori Range--have been opened on October 1. Although there are Jeep Safari and Elephant Safari, only Jeep Safari was launched on October 1. "This is a good sign this time, we have so far received footfalls of 28,980 tourists, which also includes 579 foreign tourists," said Director of the Kaziranga National Park Sonali Ghosh.

Disclosing further details, Ghosh said that it is a good sign that within a month of the inauguration of the park, it has been able to record 28,980 footfalls. "We have earned Rs 65 lakhs as revenue so far from these tourists this year," said the park director. It may be mentioned that the park authorities have opened the park for the 2024-25 tourist season on October 1 this year. However, the park has opened only partially--the central range, the Burhapahar range and the Bagori range--the rest of the ranges were not opened for tourists due to maintenance and repair of roads, which were underway.

"Today, we have opened the Agoratoli range. Now tourists can visit the Agoratoli range also," said the park director while interacting with the media on Saturday. It may be recalled that in the 2023-24 tourist season, 3,27,493 tourists visited the park, which included 13,919 foreign tourists and the park authorities connected Rs 8.81 crore of revenue from the tourists in the 2023-24 season.

It may be noted that the Kaziranga National Park is one of the major tourist pulls in the state. Although the park is famous for its one-horned rhino population, the park is also a tiger reserve and is known for elephants, wild water buffalo and swamp deer.

While at present there are 2,613 one-horned rhinos, the park also has 135 Royal Bengal Tigers. Apart from this, the park was also recognised as an important bird area by BirdLife International for the conservation of avifaunal species. During the winter season, birds such as the lesser white-fronted goose, ferruginous duck, Baer’s pochard duck, lesser adjutant, greater adjutant, black-necked stork, and Asian openbill stork migrate from Central Asia.