The challenge is no longer simply to draw tourists to India’s shores, but to ensure that tourism does not destroy the very coastline that attracts them. If India’s coastal tourism is to grow sustainably, Goa’s experience with carrying capacity, conservation, and ensuring that local communities share the gains offers valuable lessons for the rest of the country

India has one of the world’s longest coastlines, and until recently, one of its least precisely measured. When the coast was remapped in 2024, it grew from 7,516 km to over 11,000 km - not because any land was added, but because finer, modern mapping captured the bays, inlets and offshore islands that older, smaller-scale charts had smoothed over. It was a quiet reminder of how much of our coast we are only beginning to see clearly, even as it carries a growing share of the nation’s tourism economy.

Nowhere is that economy more visible than in Goa. Last year, the state welcomed close to 1.08 crore visitors - several times its resident population - along a beach coastline of barely 105 km. Tourism accounts for more than a sixth of Goa’s economy and a third of its jobs. More than the numbers, though, what sets Goa apart is experience: few places in India have managed tourism at this intensity for as long or learnt as much in the process.

That experience is worth drawing on, because India is not short........

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