"So much hype was created around the calamity....people are scared of visiting even Dehradun, Rishikesh and Nainital even though these places are as safe as Delhi," said Bahuguna at a seminar titled 'Resurgent Uttarakhand', which The Times of India Group had organized in association with the state government.
"Our tourism is badly affected and we have suffered losses worth Rs 12,000 crore."
Bahuguna said the temple area in Kedarnath, which the floods had devastated and killed around 6,000 people besides stranding another one lakh, was safe and had been cleaned up for puja to restart from September 11.
The CM gave a broad overview of how the state was planning to recover from the devastation and thanked Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh, who was present at the seminar along with environmentalists, engineers, professors, for standing by him during difficult times.
Bahuguna underlined his government's primary concern was to have a balance between "all our issues" and the environment.
He called for setting up a Himalayan Development Authority, comprising the Himalayan states, as "our ecological, tourism and agricultural needs are different from the rest of the country".
Ramesh spoke on the issue of hydel power projects and the need to protect the environment. "The government of India has to take a view on what is the optimal use of hydel projects. The cost, after all, will be borne by the local people."
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