For many a tourist for many a decade, staying in a houseboat has been the highlight of a visit to Kashmir. Floating on the serene waters of the Dal and Nagin lakes in the Valley, with picturesque mountains forming the backdrop, houseboats have been hosting visitors, mostly from the West, since colonial times. But suddenly, this idyllic tradition has been threatened, and simply because nothing was done when there was time.
On the surface, the reasoning sounds right-headed. On 8 March, based on a decree by the Jammu & Kashmir High Court, the state government ordered the approximately 1200 houseboat owners on these lakes to suspend business. In all likelihood, the court's decision was prompted by a recent report by the state's Pollution Control Board (PCB), which warned that the open lavatories and refuse from the houseboats' kitchens were a major source of pollution in the lakes. As it stands, when tourists and service staff use the toilets, the excreta is dumped directly into the lake, with no system in place to store and transport the waste to treatment centres or outside the lake. According to the PCB's estimates, the influx of pollutants into Dal Lake exceeds the permissible limit by six to eight times. At present, houseboat owners are being told to take immediate measures to handle solid and liquid wastes as per the regulations of the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA), a department responsible for controlling pollution in the lakes. Those not complying will no longer be allowed to house guests.
The directive has come as a shock for the tourism industry as a whole, and tour operators, hoteliers, houseboat owners and travel agents are in a quandary. "We have taken advance bookings, and were anticipating a good tourist year," said Yasir Ahmad, a tour operator. "Now I have to keep my phone switched off – I have no answers for my clients." The ban is coming just prior to the peak tourist season of summer, and the hope was for a good season in a region buffeted by decades of unrest. Many in the tourism industry had been quite optimistic for the upcoming year, following a dismal season last year in the aftermath of the clashes over the Amarnath land-transfer issue.
Introduced by the British sometime in the early 1900s, houseboats in Srinagar remain synonymous with style and luxury. Made of cedar wood, they often have highly decorated ceilings of khatamband, a traditional form of woodworking. A wooden staircase generally leads to the boat's deck, from where the expanse of water and the surrounding snowbound hills and mountains can be seen. Even the smallest houseboats are outfitted with spacious drawing rooms, a dining room and two bedrooms, each with a dressing room – and attached bathroom. It is the throwback approach to how these latter function that the court is now saying is no longer acceptable.