Adii Dande, 42, was on holiday in Sarajevo, Bosnia, in 2019, when she met a fellow traveller, a woman from the UK. “She carried her own foldable frying pan, and made all her meals in it,” Dande recalls. “It fascinated me. That was the first time I thought about how I was travelling and wondered whether I was harming the environment, even if it was unintentional.”

She also stays at backpacker hostels and makes the most of the ones that have attached kitchen gardens and provide basic ingredients and pots and pans for guests. “Unless there’s a local delicacy that I really must try, I prefer cooking for myself with ingredients from local markets and small cooperatives,” Dande says. “Many hostels and hotels clean the room only when guests ask. I think it’s great! If I’m staying just for a couple of nights, I don’t ask.”

Mandip Singh Soin has a head start on them. The mountaineer, environmentalist and Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, has spent over 40 years in adventure travel. He’s also the founding president of the Responsible Tourism Society of India (RTSOI). It doesn’t all have to be frugal living, bare bones travelling, uncomfortable bus rides or cooking your own meals. But planning helps.

By the time CGH Earth gave up the lease for Bangaram in 2010, they had already opened other resorts that carried forward the same tenets of responsible tourism, in Kerala, Pondicherry, and Tamil Nadu. Holidays at Dominic’s resorts don’t come cheap – packages cost about ₹50,000. About 80% of participants in Booking.com’s 2023 Sustainable Travel Report believe sustainable travel options to be more expensive. But hotel owners across India, big and small, are making finding new ways to do right by Earth and patrons’ budgets.

In Ranthambore, Jaisal Singh’s luxury campstay Sujan Sher Bagh has all the trappings of a high-end vacation: 12 tented suites, brass bathtubs, private walled gardens, a spa, restaurant and complimentary laundry. Guests pay upwards of ₹95,000 per night for the experience. The hotel has won several awards for its environmentally friendly practices and Singh has authored books on wildlife, serves on Rajasthan’s State Wildlife Board, the Standing Committee for Wildlife and the state’s Tiger Expert Committee.

Younger travellers, those between 25-35, care for about the experience than about fancy lodgings or upgrades, says Shannon Fernandes, co-founder of Mumbai-based Vagabond Experiences, which runs backpacking trips and treks around the country. “Our travellers are more than okay with carrying their own water bottles and towels, living in homestays with minimal facilities, travelling by public transport and practising slow tourism,” he says. “But from what I’ve noticed, sustainable travel practices matter far more to the organisers. I’ve rarely experienced clients inquiring about them.” It will be a while before Dande and her kind start to become the norm.

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