Having organised treks across India since 1986, Nisarga Tourism was established as a company in 2000. Since 2004, it has focused on promoting destinations in Maharashtra, training local resources in villages and small towns as guides, homestay operators, etc.
Founder-director Sanjay Naik said the company offers specially curated tours for pilgrimages, culinary journeys, biodiversity tours and adventure tourism including regular rock-climbing and rappelling courses near Pune and Mumbai. The company has over 200 options for treks and hikes through jungles, around the Koyna lake, etc. One biodiversity trek is from Bhimashankar and ends in Chandoli national park.
“Maharashtra is not just Mumbai or Lonavala, Ashtavinayak temples or Konkan’s beaches. Many places have not even been touched,” said Naik.
Along with government and industry bodies, they have trained young people to be tour guides as a source of local livelihood. “Some of those we trained are now working in the tourism sector in their villages instead of going to cities to search for work,” said Naik. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the Nisarga team conducted 30 webinars with people exploring the possibility of setting up homestays.
All the food in their group tours are based on locally available, seasonal and traditional cuisines, including sampling of local produce. They also focus on sustainable tourist behaviour, avoiding plastic bottles, preferring to use water from natural sources instead.
“Domestic tourism into Maharashtra can do much better. If Kerala or Himachal are seen as great places for eight-day holidays, why not Maharashtra?” he said.
