There is often talk of making Delhi a global city on the lines of some of the big cities globally, like London and New York. What will it take to realise this dream of many? A conversation around this interesting proposition, at a recent BITB Conclave, in New Delhi featured Shumsher Sheriff, former secretary general, Rajya Sabha; Rajeev Talwar, former MD, Delhi Tourism and CEO, DLF Limited; Kapil Kaul, aviation expert and India head of CAPA Consulting; Sanjeev Bhargav, founder, Seher Foundation which does big ticket events; Tarun Thakral, hotelier and founder, National Heritage and Transport Museum; and Rajeev Mehra, president, Indian Association of Tour Operators. Moderating the session was Navin Berry, founder, BITB Conclaves and Editor, Cross Section Conversations.
Navin Berry: It gives me great pleasure to welcome such a distinguished panel sitting here on a subject which has been very close to my personal passion and ambition, somewhere making Delhi a global city of the dimensions and eminence of some big cities of the world, London, Paris, New York, why not Delhi in the same league? I was fortunate in asking my close friend and colleague Kapil Kaul, who does normally aviation studies. He put together a study on Delhi as a capital city, global dimensions, making it London, New York. So, Kapil, can I just start off with you to ask you just highlight top four, five big points that you had made in that study?
Kapil Kaul: If I recollect, it’s been almost about 7-8 years. Mr. Kejriwal had just joined that time as chief minister. So, I think the whole pitch to him was that Delhi is a global city. It has almost everything that can translate into London or cities like London. The question is that do we want to make it? And the roadmap was that to become a global city, Delhi has culture, history, heritage of thousands of years. Food is outstanding as for Delhi is concerned. The other part that time when we did it, Delhi Airport was not to the level that we have today. The missing ingredients was that Delhi was not a hub at that time. I’m talking about 10 years back.
What we have today is this convergence of some structural factors that can actually make Delhi a global city and a global hub. Now when I say a global hub, I first talk about global airport hub and that acts as a catalyst to ensure that the rest of the elements of becoming a global city gets fast-tracked. So, our view was that if the government actually wants, if it still wants or if it wants in a year or so to wake up and say Delhi has outstanding foundations to become a global city. Now we have luckily an airport which has 130-140 million capacity. If you go 50 kilometers from Delhi you have an airport which will have another 100 million capacity.
So we are talking about between two airports, 200 million plus capacity. You have for the first time in about possibly 30-40 years, that you have two principal carriers who have the means, and the balance sheet and the will to turn into a global airlines. Long haul, ultra long haul which are getting augmented every six months.
I think we have the structural convergence right now to become a global city. The question primarily is I never felt that the Delhi government until now was really interested in tourism or any activity related to tourism. If it was and it took an ownership, I think many of the things will fall in place.
Navin Berry: Since you have touched the subject of aviation hub, what is missing now from what we have? And the fact that now we will be on the verge very soon of having three airports. Do you think our capability to hub goes up that much more?
Kapil Kaul: I think Delhi and Noida are two different airports, there are 50-60 kilometers between them. And if the government of India decides to have high speed connectivity between these two airports, these two different airports will become an airport system for Delhi, which will be transformational and will change urban economics permanently. The point I was trying to make is that what we didn’t have before was we didn’t have principal carriers which are the architects to build hubs. Look at Dubai for example, 80% or 70% is Emirates. You look at London, 50% is British Airways. Look at Frankfurt, majority Lufthansa. Paris, if you look at its Air France, KLM. We didn’t have the principal carriers who are the architects to build hubs. Now, luckily, after the privatization of Air India, which I think is a game-changing decision by the government of India, it will reflect in form and shape which we haven’t seen in maybe a couple of years. We have now Air India operating about 65 long-haul planes. They’re going to add another 50 in the near term. So Indigo is, in my assessment, very aggressive as far as white-body is concerned. We expect the next 10 years, India’s white body to be 150 from where they are now. So, you would expect a transformational air connectivity from India to the rest of the world.
Navin Berry: Just to ask you one final question on airports, the one common factor for all these cities that we are talking about is a strong national carrier. You think as opposed to our present policy of not allowing enough foreign carriers to operate, I mean they’ve been always languishing asking for increased bilaterals, does that impede our capacity to become a global hub?
Kapil Kaul: I think bilaterals are a government’s decision, it’s my view that the government cannot hold bilaterals beyond a point. It is inevitable for the government to give bilaterals and in the next six months of this fiscal, certainly in FY26 you will see bilaterals in a very moderate manner. But there will always be this view of the Indian carriers that we are investing billions of dollars, you are asking us to put in a lot of money, we are going through, we’ve just gone through COVID, allow us some room so that we develop independent networks. On the other side, bilaterals, let’s say from Dubai or Qatar or Singapore or Turkey, has strategic geopolitical elements into it, very strategic trade elements into it. For example, with Dubai, they signed an FTA, which was more favorable to India than to Dubai. So, there is always going to be a quid pro quo. Now this government has successfully managed to ensure that the bilaterals are not given, but I think it’s reaching a stage that this aero-political challenge may become a bilateral relationship issue at some point of time. So, the bilaterals are inevitable.
Navin Berry: Tarun, all these big cities are Meccas of art galleries and museums. We have them, but they’re not on our map. Are we people who don’t go to museums in Delhi, but we happily go in London and New York? Is the experience lacking, or is the promotion lacking, or is the awareness lacking? How do we make Delhi a big hub for museums, galleries, history and all that?
Tarun Thakral: The problem with India and Indian museums is that we are very boring. Nobody wants to go there. As school children, when we are in schools, we are forced to go into Indian museums. We go in a straight line, we see half the things here, half the things there, and we are back to our schools in our respective school buses. Unfortunately, nothing in museums has changed over a period of time. And that’s what’s made them very boring. So, when I thought of creating a museum in the country, I wanted to break that mindset. That museums should be fun. Museums should be entertaining. And that’s where we succeeded.
Now, when you look at it from a city perspective, that why can’t National Museum become interesting? Why can’t museums be more interesting, dynamic, more visitor-friendly? It boils down that Indian museums are not storytelling experiences. In order for a museum to succeed world over, museums have to be storytellers. They have to create a story. And that’s what a curator does very beautifully there. So, is this change happening now? It is happening. Kiran Nadar, the Museum of Art is coming up in a big way. They are great storytellers. Delhi museums have a lot of good collection. But it’s not been curated well according to today’s generation. Today’s generation is the button generation, or the Gen Z, as we call it. Their attention spans are very low. And we need to create stories in order to keep their interests alive.
Navin Berry: So coming to you, Sanjeev. Sanjeev runs Seher Foundation and he’s been actively involved in big ticket events across the country. One particular point which you may like to address is what Tarun just mentioned about continuity. You have a Surajkund Crafts Mela which happens on the 15th of February every year. Why doesn’t Delhi have some 10 maybe 50, 60 big ticket events, we don’t even have an annual film festival. So, what is holding us back?
Sanjeev Bhargav: First of all, I don’t know how many people know SEHER, my organization. In 2000 I started talking to the then Chief Minister and I really wanted the use of monuments and parks for democratizing culture and for using culture for promoting inbound tourism into India. Because Delhi at that time, had monuments where I sent surveys, people who were doing surveys, young boys and girls I hired and I said see how many people enter Purana Kila. You’ll be surprised that there were perhaps 700-800 people coming into Purana Kila or Humayun’s tomb at that time and out of that you’ll be very surprised to know not even 10% were genuine tourists. Most of them were young couples looking for a little bit of privacy. And it’s a shame. I think we talk about sustainability of tourism; we talk about sustainability of global cities. So, I wanted to do cultural events in heritage monuments and parks. Much is talked about ease of doing business. There was no ease of doing business at that time. That’s why people must understand what does tourism gain out of culture? What does a city gain out of doing large ticket festivals or events? And then we set up some of the biggest festivals of a classical dance at Purana Kila, Nehru Park, Qutub Minar and unfortunately, they lasted till 2014. So, basically now when we have the big Udaipur World Music Festival which we do, my company does, and Vasundhara Raje, you know this is what I’m saying, that these are names who are interested in culture, aesthetics. There has to be everybody interested in culture. Cannes Film Festival draws huge tourists, but it’s been happening at the same place, at the same Palais de Cannes and its same hotels are there since, God knows, 70 years.
Navin Berry: My question is, do we need a policy for such events?
Sanjeev Bhargav: That’s what I’m saying, that the reason I’m saying all this is you need to have sustainability. You need to hammer into people that you keep having the same festivals, large ticket events. Tell me Delhi doesn’t have an opera house. It doesn’t have a good concert hall. How can you have classical? So, unless people give importance to culture and what it can do, it’s a means to the end. It is not the end.
Navin Berry: So would you also not say that we are looking for revenue streams, we want more jobs to be created, we’re looking at new streams in terms of economic activity. Are we missing the bus in not having put so many of these things into place?
Sanjeev Bhargav: You see when you do events, GDP goes up. The GDP of a city goes up, the restaurants start doing well, the hotels do well.
Navin Berry: I’ll come to Shumsher Sheriff, who has worked in every major department in Delhi, state government, also at the center. He has had tourism experience in the Andamans. He’s been Secretary General of Rajya Sabha, so a distinguished civil administrator. He’s worked with the President of India, Vice President of India. Now, Shumsher, tell me, how does government – we’re talking about things which Delhi needs or can do or with – how does government provide an enabling environment for all these things to flourish? You and your colleagues in the service are fully conscious of all that they are saying, but what is it that is stopping us from putting that system into place where much of this promise can get realized. From your experience, how do we put that enabling influence or ecosystem into place?
Shumsher Sheriff: My experience, if I may put it in a historical perspective, limited to this particular issue which we are discussing of Delhi as a hub and keeping the focus only on that. Now, in 40 years that I served in government, I started here in Delhi in 1977, when there was Jang Sangh in power. And then came the Congress. And then came a variety of others, and we finally ended up with the Congress again when I became Principal Home Secretary. But nothing changed. In between, as Transport Commissioner, as it’s now called, the longest serving for four years, at that particular point of time, I was told, take charge of tourism also.
Now you see, that’s where the real problem begins. Tourism was seen as an appendage of transport. It was not seen as an independent department. It was not seen as an independent department. It was not seen as an independent entity for which Delhi had every possibility. What you had then, you have now, and you had a century earlier, culture, heritage, and all of you have mentioned this, and all of you know it, connectivity. After all, if you go back to pre-independence, you had Lahore on one side, and you had Calcutta on the other side. In between, they were just small cities, including Delhi. But you had everything going for you, but you missed every opportunity. And you missed those opportunities right up to the Commonwealth Games. I had something to do with it, and fortunately, I pulled out faster than people thought I would, because I realized it was headed towards disaster. The point is, Delhi has the potential, Delhi has the ability, Delhi has the infrastructure which plus or minus can improve, et cetera, et cetera. But what you asked me, what was missing?
Governance. What Delhi lacks is political will. Take the metro. I will not take more than a second on that. When I proposed the metro for Delhi, it was shot down by the government of India in 1986. I said, how can you survive in a city growing in leaps and bounds? How are you going to have a transportation system? So, let’s think of a metro. I was shot down. No, no, Delhi doesn’t need a metro. It’s Bangalore that needs a metro. So. we missed a number of opportunities like this. And why I’m saying that is, tourism was one area where you could have picked up.
Let’s look ahead what tourism needs. So, I will put it in one word, what Delhi lacks is political will and lack of governance. Now lack of governance, you might say, okay this is a big broad-branded word, now please explain what you mean by lack of governance. Now the lack of governance as I would put it is, you have a power structure which is fragmented, you have a leadership which is dual, you have urban planning that is multiple, and you have services which are disjointed and you have no coordination with the NCR. How can you build a global hub when you have so many things which you need to address and what you need to address is governance. You need a unified authority. To address all these issues, you need what I would say is a streamlined governance, clear accountability, efficient planning and execution, and a unified central authority. Delhi needs to get its act together. The people of Delhi need to get their act together. You need a mayor. The first proposal to have a mayor in Delhi was in 1966, when Delhi became a Union Territory. It was shot down for political reasons, which we won’t go in over here. So, you missed that opportunity. You need one unified authority, one person who takes the decision, one person who is responsible for it.
Now, tourism, when I was looking at the tourism department, we proposed something. Let’s make tourism an industry. So, we said, let’s prepare a paper and let’s give tourism the status of an industry. I don’t know where we stand today. I’m told it’s nowhere near. And I’m talking about 1986. I put it before the Planning Commission, saying that look, unless you give them an industry status you’re not going to get anywhere. There were no hotels around Delhi, there were no Maurya, there were no Sheraton. After all, if you want to have a global hub, what is it you need? Your city must have something like a power structure. A power, it should be powerful enough to attract investments. It should be able to take decisions quick, fast, and adaptable. It’s not a city that is going to only have attract people. It’s got to be for people who live here also. They have to be part and parcel of this whole thing. So, for all this, you need a governance structure.
Navin Berry: Over to you Rajeev, you have been Administrator Lakshadweep. You were involved actively in tourism. You are a former MD of Delhi Tourism, we are talking about an enabling environment, I also want to ask you could the role of DTDC evolve today in being something that we are talking about as an agency which can assist in putting all these things together. At the moment it is more busy selling alcohol but it can do something more.
Rajeev Talwar: I think what we are really missing out over here today is that government has no place. All of you keep on paying respects to the government, we want a unified authority, we want environment, all of it has already happened. You know for a fact that Delhi needs people in the private sector to work. We will always have good hands of the government. You will always meet the wrong politician and you will always meet the right politician and the right bureaucrat. Why do we have DDA here? You will get permissions for hotels; you have got it over here. You have got permissions, hotels have been made whether it is the Taj Mansingh, whether it is Shangri-La which was made as Yatrinivas, whether it is Lalit, whether it is Meridian, you will always get permissions and it is the private sector which is going. We have plenty of domestic tourism. Why are we not setting a target of a 100 million tourists from abroad including NRIs? NRIs are already allowed to buy properties in India. 25% of the sales of properties in India is marked out for NRIs, they are the best investors here in this country. But can you allow foreigners to own properties? That’s a moot question. I think it’s loaded both the sides because then the rates of property will go up and you will promote some kind of illegality, maybe or maybe not. So we’ve had success stories here, rules have been changed. You know the Cinematograph Act had to be changed. It was in 1952 it was made and then the Chief Minister of Delhi, the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi and the Home Ministry took it together to say that you cannot have a cinema or a multiplex 250 meters from a school or a religious institution and 75 meters from a petrol pump. Kyunki petrol pump ko there is a danger to the petrol pump it might be blown up. So those rules had to be changed. Rules will get changed.
So why are we not allowing institutions and government institutions to disappear? Which is what Suman was saying. will there be an implosion? Great individual initiatives springing up all over the country. Museums, why do we need the government? The government is itself; the museum is located in the Janpath hotel now. So, you have got everything going, it’s the private sector which needs to take up up whether it’s training, whether it’s skilling. I mean you have the best; the government has done its bit. Do you think we could have done a global show better than the G20? If anything was lacking in it, it was, I mean I don’t think there was anything lacking, it was an outstanding show. You had the Mahakumbh here, can you have a bigger event? Not done by the central government, Varanasi, Jahan-e-Khusro has been done under Mr. Modi by Muzaffar Ali. So, you have people who are doing it and they can do it.
Navin Berry: Is there a possibility in your personal opinion from your experience of government for an expanded role for Delhi tourism? Allow me to say that while you are saying why government, why not the private sector, all cities whether it is French, whether it is New York, New York City has a New York Tourism Board. I wouldn’t say controlled, but apexed from somebody in government. Then the private sector comes in and sits on that panel, and then the private sector drives it, maybe private sector even funds it. All these museums you are talking about, they are government institutions which have been handed over to trusts. They are not privately owned. Kiran Nadar institute is a different thing altogether. She has a budget of only 800 crores annually to spend on art.
Can government provide an enabling environment?
Rajeev Talwar: Yes. That’s all. government doesn’t need to provide; we need to help ourselves. We had shortage of hotels; we were talking of number of permissions. Look what Sunil Bharti Mitral has done. With GMR, the system has been worked out, Aerocity 1, Aerocity 2, that’s the best place we have for hotels today. It will lead to another kind of rush; that’s a separate point.
Navin Berry: Rajiv Mehra, I wanted you to be the last speaker of this session. When you hear all this, as the president of the Indian Tour Operators Association, how do you find Delhi as a city to be marketed and sold by an Indian tour operator overseas? Has that experience changed in recent years? How is it happening, evolving for Delhi as a city to be marketed?
Rajiv Mehra: It’s a very valuable point. You see, over the last 10 years, things have changed in Delhi. However, we are still lacking, as Kapil said. Delhi is becoming a hub of connecting flights, whether it is Air India or Indigo. Air India is definitely trying to have a stopover also. If you want to book, they’ll give you a stopover of 24 hours or things like that. And that’s something great for Delhi. Now when we talk about museums and all these things, specially we totally lack everything and anything in the evenings in this city. So, this is what a tourist wants. We need to have those kinds of things. Coming to museums, when you talk about private, what happened to Madam Trussard? Disappeared. Why? After spending so much of money. They were in touch with me, their person from their head office in Australia also came to my office and met me. The worst problem was of parking. There is no place to park a coach because coaches are not allowed in the outer circle of Connaught Place. This is the reason why we are having Delhi as a two-night stay for tourists. One full day for sightseeing is enough. Second full day we are now keeping it for Lotus Temple or for Akshardham and that is it. And that is it. We need to have more such things which are not boring, very important. The clients should like those places and do it. Cleanliness overall in the last couple of years has improved. We are not that bad as what we used to be earlier. But still, the worst part is if you are coming by train, you enter Delhi from anywhere. It’s all dirt all around. So, we need to change all these things. We need to improve all those things. Then only a tourist will come and stay here for a longer duration.
Navin Berry: Just one question over the last five years, much has changed in the MICE capability of Delhi. In fact, it must be one of the biggest or bigger convention centres in this entire region, not India. With Dwarka, Bharat Mandapam, we have more capacity. Is anybody putting it together? Are we selling Delhi as a MICE capital any better?
Rajiv Mehra: Well, as far as MICE is concerned, we have ample of capacity available now, whether it’s the Dwarka or Bharat Mandapam or even the Greater Noida one. But again, it is very difficult to get conferences here. Problem is that to get a conference you have to apply to MHA first and then MHA will give a permission and then only the e-visas and those things will start. You can’t. Why do you need MHA’s approval to have a conference here? If any terrorist has to come, he will come as a normal tourist also. Why do you want to control it? So that’s another problem. So, MHA has couple of issues. So, we told MHA also, please relax these rules.
Rajeev Talwar: I think the private sector needs to take things in their hands. You will always meet people in the government somewhere who will be not so good but there will be others who will be very very good and very receptive. I am just reminded of two things, you have got Yashobhoomi here, why is it with the government? You have the JIO center in Mumbai which is doing great activities. We had created a destination in the 60s over here. It was nothing to do with the government. You had no alcohol that time but you had butter chicken coming out of Moti Mahal and a qawwali every evening over there. After that the art of qawwali has disappeared from Delhi. None of the private sector institutions have taken it up and said, okay, one of these big hotels can do it. Why can we not have those approvals and flat policy that approvals for hotels, five star or whatever, more than 200 rooms, need no licensing, multiple licenses.
Navin Berry: So, that’s immense food for thought. Delhi has much going for it. It needs political will and a more pro-active private sector.
