PINAKI MAJUMDAR
Jamshedpur, Dec 8: Steel city residents are either cancelling or rescheduling their travel plans over growing fear of the Omicron variant of Covid-19.
Information gathered from various tour operators / travel agencies revealed that residents who had plans of spending Christmas and New Year’s-Eve in places like Goa, Puducherry and Kerala have kept their plans on hold.
” We don’t want to take a risk over the current threat of Omicron, a new Covid variant and hence have cancelled our trip to Goa this Christmas. We had booked a cottage for spending Christmas in Goa. But, due to the Omicron threat we have cancelled our plan of visiting Goa, ” said T Mathews, a Tata Steel employee.
Several residents who made bookings for spending winter vacations in Darjeeling and Sikkim are left second-guessing.
” We are keeping our fingers crossed over our plans to visit Gangtok in the last week of December. The Covid cases are on the rise, things are still uncertain, ” pointed out Vivek Sen, a resident of Sonari.
Significantly, more than the fear of Omicron, the uncertainty caused by frequently changing travel protocols is prompting people to take such decisions.
Travel agencies, which are usually flooded with inquiries during this time of the year, have also witnessed a slump in their business.
An official of a leading tour operator in the steel city said several families who had plans to visit destinations within the country have cancelled bookings over the Omicron threat.
” We are getting inquiries of foreign destinations like Dubai and Bangkok but no confirmations yet, ” said the official adding that they are yet to recover from the losses incurred during the lockdowns last year.
The Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 virus, which first surfaced in South Africa, has already been detected in Belgium, Botswana, Hong Kong, Britain, Australia, Israel and some other countries, sparking global concern.
