Govt. of Uttarakhand has taken an important step towards the rehabilitation of Border Villages under the Vibrant Village Programme and chosen Jadung in Uttarkashi district for a first-of-its-kind initiative.
The village of Jadung has not been inhabited since 1962 when the villagers were moved out during the Indo–China dispute.
In the first phase, the Tourism Department will renovate and refurbish six homes that are currently in a dilapidated state and promote them as Homestays. The unique feature of this project is that, while the Department of Tourism will be redeveloping the houses as homestays, these will be operated/run by the villagers. The houses will be refurbished in vernacular architecture using locally available materials.
Sh. Sachin Kurve, Secretary – Tourism informed that this will enable the generation of self-employment opportunities for the villages of Jadung and provide a unique tourism destination. He also informed that the villagers will have to operate the homestays at least for a period of 10 years.
The homestay operators will be chosen by the District Administration of Uttarkashi by seeking applications from the original inhabitants of the village through a committee. The operational guidelines for the homestays have also been finalized.
The tourism department is also planning to provide adequate skill and soft skills training to the homestay operators, which would be organized from time to time by the department and the department will also provide necessary support for marketing and promotion of these homestays.
This unique initiative of the Tourism Department was approved by the Cabinet and will now be rolled out. It is expected that the scheme will become a milestone towards reverse migration through government intervention and produce create new opportunities for tourism.
