Bhatkal: Demonetisation has not only affected those possessing black money but also tourism in Uttara Kannada district. Many tourist destinations in the district which used to be crowded with tourists are now wearing a near deserted look.

Tourism in the district picks up post rainy season and with beginning of October month. Major tourist destinations including Gokarna and Murdeshwar used to witness nearly 35,000 to 40,000 tourists everyday. Sometimes, the number crossed a lakh also. Hundreds of local people are dependent on the tourists to earn their livelihood. The number of people having petty shops, pushcarts and also big hotels, restaurants, lodging is increasing year after year. But this year, the picture is different. After demonetisation announced on November 8, the number of tourists has come down considerably. Shop keepers and those business dependent on tourism are facing 80 per cent fall in their business. The guest houses, lodges and the beautiful beaches are almost deserted, “Earlier, our daily business was Rs 5,000 but now, we hardly earn Rs 800”, said many shop keepers.

Ramesh working with a private company in Bengaluru said that he had to face lot of inconvenience due to scraping of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denomination noes. But as they had planned to go on a vacation well in advance, they decided to continue with it. For that, he had to wait in a queue for two days and get the new notes. But the shopkeepers and hotel were not accepting Rs 2,000 notes as they did not have change. The tour itself became boring for their family.

Murdeshwar Temple Manager Manjunath Shetty said that the number of tourists visiting Murdeshwar has gone down since ten to 12 days. However, it is slowly returning to normalcy. He said that in the meantime, the district administration is cleaning the beaches and is taking up many development work for improving basic facilities. As the number of petty shops, push carts and also tourists on the beach is less, the beauty of the beach has doubled.