India led as the top source market for Sri Lanka’s tourism sector for the month of April 2023. India regained the top spot after six months as almost 20,000 Indian tourists arrived in the island nation last month. Sri Lanka’s Tourism Authority figures showed that 19,915 Indians had visited the island in April over 14,656 Russian tourist arrivals.
Russians remained the top inbound market from October 2022 to March this year. Tourist arrivals from India in 2022 stood at 1.23 lakhs with a share of 17.1 per cent. In April, the arrivals topped 100,000 for the fourth consecutive time since in the island taking the total arrivals in the first four months to over 4.4 lakhs.
Sri Lanka has achieved nearly 7.2 lakh tourist arrivals in 2022. Chairman of the SLTDA Priantha Fernando had said last month that the target for tourist arrivals in Sri Lanka will be revised to 20 lakhs from the initial estimates of 15 lakhs.