Our Mission Statement at explorIndya

"explorIndya is a Family-operated travel company setup to share and extend our passion for travel, discovery and learning while at the same time creating a sense of awareness about the different ecologies we travel through and showcasing ancient Indian art and craft forms with the aim of sustenance, not only of the art forms but also the lives and economies that depend on them."

explorIndya was created with the vision to run and manage a business that would offer our guests traveling to India an extremely personal form of travel, shared with members of the family.

As individuals we are passionate about traveling; with the objectives being to discover and experience new places but more importantly put these places into perspective by understanding and learning about its history, people and their cultures and the realities that surround them in this changing world.

What also drives us is a strong will to actively conserve and encourage consciousness of this country's ecology and our local eco-system right here in the Nilgiri Hills.

Finally it's our strong patriotism for India that drew us all back to build a life here. As artists within the family, we understand the importance of preserving ancient art and craft forms, sadly disappearing at an alarming rate. Our travel is a means whereby we spread the awareness of the art and help in sustaining the livelihoods of the people, villages and local economies that depend on them.

Our Economic Responsibilities

At explorIndya we are passionate about our country and we strongly believe that our artisans and their ancient forms of art and craft form a strong basis of India?s identity. However as the country progresses towards more modern living, they face an increasingly difficult time surviving against mass-produced ?art? and ?artifacts? that are being produced today.

Having artists among us in the Family, we have learnt to appreciate the need to conserve local and national forms of art and crafts.

We are based in the Nilgiri Hills of TamilNadu situated in the forested Western Ghats. These forested hills used to be home to the Toda tribes of the Nilgiris whose art consists of traditional garments spun from fibers and natural fruit and berry dyes sourced from the surrounding forests. With development, the tribes were forced out of their forest dwellings and were ?rehabilitated? in villages outside. However this drastic change in their life, threatened the very art that defined their identity and the means to the only livelihood they knew. Being a part of the local community here in the Nilgiris, we took it up to make sure this art form doesn?t die out like the ancient Toda lifestyle sadly has. We further their art today by sourcing all their products from their Community Center located in the town a few miles away and encourage all our guests visiting us here in the Nilgiris to buy some artifact as a gesture of support towards the Toda lifestyle. Over the years we have generated a lot of interest in the minds of our guests and have led them to the few remaining tribal settlements in the hills to view this unique art form and livelihood.

Going beyond the hills of the Nilgiris and our local economy, we look to support craft forms that we have encountered along our travels through South India. From the ancient art of inlay woodwork in Mysore to the 5000-year old tradition of Lost Wax sculpting in Swamimalai, to name only a few, we as a family have actively championed their causes over these years. Now with explorIndya we plan to showcase these precious craft forms to all our guests who visit, with the hope that their active interest, contributions and photographs will spread awareness of not only the craft but its creators around the world, thereby keeping these unique identities of our country alive for the next generation.

The other two practices that we find worth mentioning are the support of the local village ?tea shops? along our routes and the use of only local gasoline sourced from Indian Oil Wells and distributed by Indian Gas Stations. The advent of the cola majors had begun to threaten the very existence of these very traditional village businesses. We offer our guests the option to experience a cup of steaming hot ?indian chai? at these village tea shops during our trips (of course only at tea shops that we mutually find satisfactory in terms of cleanliness and hygiene). This not only makes for an unforgettable experience but also benefits the villager?s family not only with the income generated but the credibility and reputation of his tea that comes with serving a guest from another country.
The other practice of only using gasoline produced locally, we feel, gives back to the local GDP of India and helps in cutting down expensive import of fuel.

Our Environmental Responsibilities

Sub-Tropical Rain Forest trees, especially the 'Montane Shola' tree species have been endemic to the Western Ghats, and the Nilgiri Hills were no exception. However years of tea cultivation and logging have severely affected large tracts of natural forest cover which had, in turn, sadly taken a huge toll on the animal and bird life in the region.

As long serving members of the Nilgiri Wildlife & Environmental Association (a local affiliate of the World Wildlife Fund), we had actively campaigned to halt the process of timber logging or for that matter clearing of natural forests for any reason whatsoever. As an organisation we represented our case in the Supreme Court, India's Highest Judicial Body, and received a decree that placed a blanket ban on any form of logging in natural forests in the Nilgiri Hills. This was a landmark ruling by the Court that not only armed the local Forest Department but also enabled organisations like ours to actively protect the remaining natural forest cover in the region.

With the court ruling almost completing a decade and the organisation's awareness campaigns in the villages, we have seen a dramatic growth and regeneration of these natural forests in many parts of the Nilgiris. However we did realize that a court ruling was not going to be enough to help in restoring the forests that made this eco-systems one of the most unique in the world. So seven-years back, as a family we started the S.O.S. Campaign. The Save Our Sholas campaign was envisioned at home by Renu to afforest any available tract of land with natural forest cover. We began work in conjunction with the local forest department who began to supply us with tree saplings from their nurseries. The objective of this exercise is to restore tracts of land, as large as possible, with natural tree cover. We have procured land on which, as a family we currently have planted 350-saplings with a 99% success rate. In addition, we sponsor the trees on lands owned by the forest department where over these years they have afforested with over 100,000 saplings, in this case with a 97% success rate. Today we have seen a rise in the bird species that thrived in these rain-forested areas. Within our property itself we have seen an addition of close to twenty-five bird species.

At explorIndya and at the homestay at Misty Heights, we actively encourage our guests to plant and own a tree or tree saplings of their choice. As of date, our guests have planted over 125 tree saplings of which all have survived. We keep our guests involved in this experience by emailing them progress photos of their sapling/ saplings.

At explorIndya I make sure that we use hotels/ resorts or homestays along our trips that are either eco-friendly in their outlook and practices or maintain a  green-change policy atleast.

As a family of vegetarians, we believe that this form of living is not only healthy but also is a more responsible way of life. On our trips at explorIndya, we actively engage our guests on this topic as we've found a growing trend towards this way of life. However we have noticed that most people know so little about the varieties available in vegetarian cuisine or diet. When it comes to vegetarianism, our objective, when we travel with our guests, is to highlight and allow them to sample the numerous healthy and nutritious options available in vegetarian cuisine throughout India.

Additionally, in the past, our trips have also supported Vegans looking to travel and we have been able to accomodate their restrictions in cuisine very comfortably given the nearly inexhaustible options available in Indian cuisine.

Given our heightened consciousness of the environment and the sad reality of improper waste disposal in India today, we make a conscientious effort in planning our activities between our places of accommodation so as to be able to comfortably carry all our garbage with us until we get to a waste disposal unit which we are confident is cleared by the local authorities or by a hotel/ resort we use that we know is responsible with it?s own waste disposal policies. In the interim, we carry, for our guests and ourselves, two separate bags for wet and dry garbage that might be generated along the way. Usually however before we begin our trips, we explain this policy of ours to our guests so as to eliminate any ambiguity of what we believe in when we travel. Till date, we have had a lot of active support of this practice and our guests have behaved very responsibly when traveling.

We attempt to be environmentally-conscious drivers and attempt at maximizing our gas mileage on our trips in our small attempt at fuel conservation. We feel that until hybrids or fuel-cell cars become a reality in India this is the second best attempt at this conservation exercise.

Our Social Responsibilities

In our small attempts at conservation and the tree planting that I highlighted in the 'Our Environmental Responsibilities' section, we utilize local people in the planting of these trees thereby generating guaranteed employment for people in the surrounding villages. By contributing regularly to a Blind Orphan Childrens Home in a nearby town, we attempt to give these children back a life affected by blindness. At this orphanage, these children are taught skills like basket weaving, tailoring, etc. in the hope that they may become self-sufficient in the future.

Community projects form an important scope of our services to our guests. For example, we take our guests to villages where we showcase, for instance, an ongoing project to eradicate the use of child labor from the Silk Saree Industry in parts of TamilNadu or a project where an entire village and its craftsmen re-grouped to revive an ancient form of sculpture casting from dying out completely. At explorIndya we are continually on the look-out for these projects as they highlight the human side of travel and which is so important in putting one?s travel into perspective.