Scope of rural tourism inroads through nonvegetarian gastronomic tradition in Western Himalayas: The Hindu’s Bakrid

This study explores the potential of rural gastronomic capital as tourism product in Shimla district of Western Indian Himalayas keeping in view the sustainable community-based approach. Bottom-up community driven approach is essential for sustainable tourism development and the state under study accounts for 89% of rural population. Gastronomic tradition is one such approach involving a large number of populations bringing them direct benefits. In this study a mixed research design was adopted for first identifying themes and lately looking for scope in a broader area. For getting initial idea 16 interviews were conducted. Upon analyzing the responses from this pilot interview study, one gastronomic tradition was identified as a popular festival celebrated with a potential of attracting tourist. In this festival a lamb is butchered at household level in 8 of 16 tehsils and various delicacies are prepared of the lamb meat including naturally dried mutton, sausages and several more dishes particularly during the winters. A questionnaire was thereafter developed to further conduct the study with a household sample each from 293 villages to analyze the future potential and acceptability of non-vegetarian gastronomic traditions as a tourism product and to identify prospects of current transition in this gastronomic tradition