Every week earlier, the couple had boarded a prepare from their hometown Berhampur in Odisha, adopted by a flight to Chennai, the place they celebrated their daughter Vandana’s birthday. From there, they didn’t take a prepare or a flight again dwelling. They as an alternative booked a two-night cruise. They picked a cabin, which didn’t have sweeping ocean views, however was slightly straightforward on the pocket.
“Some rooms have been priced at Rs 1 lakh and above. We booked an ordinary room for Rs 41,600, which lined our keep together with fundamental meals and drinks. We’ll at all times cherish this second,” says Rao, as he poses for a photograph with the ship within the background. Mangama laughs alongside, each savouring a reminiscence they’ve simply created.
Like Rao and Mangama, Indians are more and more going for brief voyages aboard cruise ships, for a style of luxurious on sea.
A wave of pleasure fills the air later that day, as passengers put together to board MV Empress for the subsequent leg—Visakhapatnam to Puducherry and onwards to Chennai. Amongst them are Sahil Singla and Nikita Verma, a younger fintech couple from Bengaluru, able to unwind at sea. There’s additionally a vigorous group of 12 first-time cruisers from Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh, who’ve booked their return tickets by prepare.
On Deck 5 of the 11-storey ship, run by Cordelia Cruises, a crew member fingers out a leaflet outlining the day’s actions, dos and don’ts and companies that come at an additional value, like salon and on line casino. Tucked within the nice print is a agency reminder of onboard decorum: spitting paan comes with a penalty of $1,000.Cruise tourism in India is charting a brand new course. An growing variety of luxurious liners are calling on our ports at the same time as the center class is discovering the pleasures of crusing. India’s cruise tourism has now set an bold goal of 1 million passengers docking at its ports yearly by 2029.
WELCOME ABOARD
“Cruise tourism is gaining robust traction amongst India’s higher middleclass phase. Rising disposable revenue of a burgeoning center and higher center class permits them to embrace cruise as a most well-liked leisure alternative,” Union Minister of Ports, Delivery and Waterways Sarbananda Sonowal tells ET. He provides that aspiration for premium journey experiences and elevated consciousness about cruise holidays are fuelling the demand.
The variety of sea cruise passengers in India noticed a five-fold enhance over the previous decade — from 1,04,125 in 2014-15 to 4,92,000 in 2024-25. This determine doesn’t embrace river cruise passengers, for which information is just not available. Nonetheless, Sonowal factors out that the fleet of luxurious river-cruise vessels grew from 3 in FY2014 to 25 in FY2025, reflecting a increase in inland cruise tourism as effectively.
FARE WELL
M Angamuthu, chairman of the Visakhapatnam Port Authority, says the rise of home cruise strains and the inclusion of Indian ports by worldwide operators have contributed to creating cruises extra accessible and interesting to Indian travellers. However he additionally strikes a notice of warning: “Pricing is, and can stay, a vital issue within the Indian cruise market.”
He elaborates: “Whereas there’s a phase that’s keen to pay for luxurious, the broad market, particularly the increasing center class, is value delicate. Aggressive pricing for itineraries, onboard facilities and shore excursions will likely be key to attracting and retaining passengers.
This implies cruise strains must optimise their operational prices and port authorities want to supply rationalised and clear tariffs.” Not like airways, cruise firms not often publicise their fares. However a number of cruisers say the per-night value of a cabin usually ranges from Rs 10,000 to a number of lakhs, relying on the extent of luxurious.
Very like first-class passengers in aviation, suite company on a cruise get pleasure from excess of a spacious bed room. They’ve entry to non-public eating areas, sundeck balconies and precedence embarkation and disembarkation at each port. Generally, the expertise is topped with an unique cocktail night with the captain.
Mumbai stays the nation’s cruise tourism hub, dealing with 102 vessels and a couple of,68,830 passengers in 2024. Nonetheless, Cochin Port noticed 28 worldwide cruise ship calls final yr in contrast with Mumbai’s 20.
Among the many international cruise giants that frequently embrace Indian ports of their itineraries are Holland America Line, Crystal Cruises, Virgin Voyages, Superstar Cruises, Silversea Cruises and Azamara. A 16-night voyage by Azamara Cruises later this yr—from Port Louis, Mauritius, to Singapore—has a two-night stopover in Cochin.
CARGO TO CRUISE
Former transport secretary Gopal Krishna says that till a couple of years in the past, India had not prioritised the event of devoted cruise terminals to draw cruise vessels. “For a very long time, Indian ports primarily functioned as cargo hubs, not as gateways for cruise passengers,” he says. “However with new cruise terminals being constructed and current ones being upgraded, we are actually higher geared up to serve cruise tourism.”
He says the game-changer for India’s cruise trade would be the capability to draw extra international vessels to make use of Indian ports as dwelling port, which implies the port the place a ship operates from, although not essentially the place it’s registered.
Homeporting of enormous cruise ships is just not merely a logistical operation, it may be a catalyst for financial development and job creation. In 2016, Costa NeoClassica, a international vessel that includes a on line casino, theatre, disco, ballroom and a 1,300 sq m wellness centre, selected Mumbai as its dwelling port for 3 months and accomplished seven voyages. Its ripple results have been highlighted by the federal government in a 2017 paper, which states a cruise vessel with a capability of three,000 passengers can generate employment for practically 1,000 folks when it makes use of an Indian port as its dwelling base.
The ripple impact extends to native companies. With every passenger spending no less than $70-100 a day on land excursions, a cruise ship fuels substantial every day transactions, injecting contemporary vitality into tourism, retail and repair sectors.
“We imagine India may have a number of dwelling ports for international cruise vessels by 2029,” says Rajiv Jalota, former chairman, Mumbai Port Authority. “The federal government’s imaginative and prescient is to allow homeporting of no less than one cruise ship every in Goa, Chennai, Kochi and Visakhapatnam, other than one or two in Mumbai.”
Jalota says discussions are at an early stage on launching open-jaw cruises from Port Blair to Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia. In open-jaw cruises, departure and arrival ports are totally different. “If the Port Blair blueprint materialises, passengers can fly to the Andaman Islands and board a cruise ship for the onward voyage,” he says.
World cruise giants are wanting to develop into Indian waters however, Jalota says, some operators are lobbying laborious for added tax advantages.
In response to Krishan Arora, accomplice, Grant Thornton Bharat, the federal government has already streamlined the tax points. He says a simplified tax regime, efficient from April 2025, permits international cruise operators to bypass cumbersome audits and filings by choosing a hard and fast share of their receipts to be handled as taxable revenue. He additionally highlights one other current reform— the removing of import duties on international cruise ships briefly working alongside India’s shoreline. “This opens up the Indian marketplace for seasonal and short-term cruise deployments, a mannequin adopted globally however beforehand impractical in India as a result of tax obstacles,” he provides.
Whereas ship-wise passenger information isn’t publicly obtainable, no less than two senior authorities officers level out that MV Empress is singlehandedly driving a lot of the current surge in numbers, a matter of concern contemplating that this French-built ship is 35 years previous. Additionally they say the vessel’s Delhi-based dad or mum firm, Waterways Leisure Tourism, is planning to amass one other cruise ship within the subsequent couple of months. Jurgen Bailom, CEO of Cordelia Cruises, has declined to remark.
One factor is obvious: the success of cruise liners will rely not simply on aggressive pricing, however on how they tailor experiences to go well with Indian travellers. Take Nayan Goel, 35, an FMCG wholesaler from Lucknow, who flew to Chennai together with his spouse Sweety and son Parth, to board the MV Empress, paying Rs 1,78,000 for a five-night cruise in an ocean-view cabin. Amongst all of the highlights of the voyage, one element stands out for him. “The restaurant on Deck 5, Starlight, serves vegetarian Jain meals,” he says with a smile.
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