50 years of tourism research in India: past trends and future directions

Purpose This study aims to conduct a bibliometric analysis of the articles related to India’s tourism sector. Articles published between 1973 and 2023 were considered to discover the knowledge gap, current trends and future direction of tourism research in India, offering a comprehensive perspective on scholarly contributions in this field. Design/methodology/approach A total of 3,436 articles were retrieved from the SCOPUS database and analyzed using VOSviewer software. The performance analysis conducted on the documents helped to find the most cited articles, journals and authors. Science mapping was conducted using co-citation, co-authorship and keyword co-occurrence analysis. Findings The results show that research in Indian tourism has been rising steadily since the 2000s. The author’s keyword analysis suggests that research done in India in the tourism sector mainly focuses on traditional aspects like religious tourism, ecotourism, green practices, adventure tourism and tourism during and after COVID-19. Additionally, seven key themes of Indian tourism research have emerged as a result of keyword co-occurrence analysis: risk and pleasure, culture and religion, sustainability, destination image and perception, medical tourism and service quality, tourist settings and development. Originality/value The study’s findings can help potential authors understand what is anticipated in the field of Indian tourism and form future research agendas.