Tourism authorities in the Himalayan Indian state of Himachal Pradesh are inviting British tourists to visit to the state's many European graveyards is an added 'bonus' on their itinerary.
According to official estimates, there are some 10 main 'European' graveyards in the state, which mainly house the remains of British people who died in India. The London-based British Association for Cemeteries in South Asia (Bacsa), however, estimates the state has a total of 42 such cemeteries. Many of them are open to the public, although new burials no longer take place there.
Rosie Llewellyn-Jones of Bacsa says the rising interest among British tourists in travelling to graveyards of ancestors is due to "often an inbuilt love of cemeteries among the British people" and a "huge boom" in genealogy and research into one's ancestors.
"A large number of British people had relatives who served in India, not just as officials, but as soldiers, shopkeepers, traders, tea planters, forest officials, teachers, missionaries, photographers," she says.
"Tourists and researchers are going to India to find and photograph the graves of their ancestors, and also to see the places where their ancestors lived and worked, so there is a spin-off effect.
You can read more about this story on the BBC's web site at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6209517.stm
