SYLHET: The tourism industry of country’s north-eastern zone has been suffering a great loss for a month due to the hartal and blockade called by BNP and its allies.

Sources said banglanews that the estimated losses in Sylhet are about Tk 50 crore since January 5.

A few holidaymakers, however, have visited the touristic town than the same time of previous years, sources added.

In early years, according to the sources, all the touristic places of the district, including natural waterfall ‘Panthumai’, swamp-forest ‘Ratargul’ and one of the most tourist destinations ‘Bichanakandi’ were abuzz with the presence of numerous visitors.

This scarcity of tourists, moreover, hit the hotel and motel business of the city.

Sylhet Hotel-Motel, Guest House Owners' Association president Tahmin Ahmad, regarding the matter, said that all the hotels and motels of the town are remaining vacant in the recent days.

“It’s made the hotels and motels’ owners incurring huge losses,” he added. “The estimate of loss in residential hotel sector is about 1.5 crore for one day and that led us to face a total loss of over Tk 45 crore in last month.”

Moreover, the restaurant business has also been suffering from a large amount of loss as the tourists were also their main clients.

However, the rest amount of the losses came from shopping, transport and other sectors.

BDST: 1725 HRS, FEB 08, 2015