Tourism Momentum

The useful part

The numbers in recent years suggest that 'conditional' is turning into a statement of fact. Over 5.21 lakh tourists visited Kashmir in the first four and a half months of 2026 alone: 5.13 lakh domestic travellers and 8,195 foreign visitors. Nearly 2.95 lakh came by road through Banihal, 1.47 lakh flew into Srinagar, and just under 56,000 arrived at the Nowgam railway station, with another 14,870 via Banihal's rail link.

How it works

• A tourism economy that used to lean almost entirely on a single highway now has air and rail absorbing a meaningful share of the load.
• For a region whose tourism numbers have too often been hostage to circumstance, a four-month run of rising arrivals across every mode of transport is worth taking seriously as evidence of something durable...

Details worth keeping

For years, Kashmir's tourism potential was spoken of conditionally: Only if the security situation stabilizes, the tourists come. Even since the arrivals have only further picked up.