India, Feb. 14 -- Here's something to ponder over. Last year India attracted 6.2 million foreign tourists. Sri Lanka attracted around 2.35 million visitors. To put this in context, consider the difference in size between the two countries. India is nearly 50 times the size of Sri Lanka. Or look at it another way. Rajasthan is the greatest attraction for foreign visitors to India. But Sri Lanka gets nearly as many tourists as all of Rajasthan. And Rajasthan is five times the size of Sri Lanka. We know why people come to India. Tourists are attracted by our history and our monuments. The Taj Mahal, for instance, is one of the world's most famous historical structures. Many upmarket visitors enjoy our palaces and our reputation as the land of maharajas and princes. And there is the sheer diversity of India, from the Himalayas to the beaches of Kerala. As our tourism authorities keep reminding foreigners, there is something for everyone in India. Sri Lanka does not have India's advantages: Famous monuments like the Taj. It has no Himalayas. It has no palaces or maharajas. And yet, its success explodes the semi-official Indian explanation for our dismal tourism performance: Foreigners are put off by stories about natural disasters and riots. Really? Then what about Sri Lanka, where a cyclone wreaked havoc a few months ago? Where rioters ran amok in the streets of Colombo and set fire to government buildings? Sri Lankan tourism bounces back seemingly effortlessly no matter how bad the global headlines have been. I wish I could analyse why Sri Lankan tourism has had more success (in relative terms) than India. But all I can tell you with certainty is that it is one of my favourite destinations and I go back year after year. Never have I returned disappointed. For Indians (but not for Europeans who flock to Sri Lanka) part of the attraction is that it is a very different country but it is also familiar enough for us to feel comfortable. Sri Lankan food is different from Indian food (even the food of the Jaffna Tamils is distinct from the cuisine of Tamil Nadu) but the rice, spices and curries do not seem strange or forbidding to us. There is more to it than that. It pains me to say this, but Sri Lankans understand hospitality much better than we do. This is not necessarily a function of history. When I first went to Colombo, their hospitality sector was in its infancy. We stayed at the Intercontinental and were told that a Hilton was opening. The deluxe hotels were either owned or financed by the government. A friend of my parents, who worked in the country's finance ministry, explained it to us: Lanka needs the hotels to boost tourism so we build them, but we let experts run them, he said. We don't believe in state-run hotels, unlike India. (The Indian government wasted thousands of crores on ITDC, which ran bad hotels all over India.) The Lankans had the sense to look all over the world for expertise. They took India's help too. The Lanka Oberoi used to be the country's best-run hotel. (The Oberois moved away during the civil war of the 1990s.) The Taj opened an excellent property in Colombo (which is still one of the city's top hotels) and another in the beach town of Bentota. More recently, ITC opened Sri Lanka's most successful hotel, the glittering ITC Ratnadipa in Colombo. All of these hotels relied on Lankan staff, and it turned out that Sri Lankans had a natural flair for hospitality. Indians make great hoteliers, but our service staff often function only in two modes: Sycophantic or unconcerned. In Lanka, on the other hand, the hospitality comes naturally. There is a graciousness to the service without needless bowing and scraping. It was only a matter of time before the Lankan hotel industry would get to the stage where there was less need for foreign expertise. Even so, I was surprised to note on my last trip to Colombo, how far their hospitality sector has travelled; in some ways far ahead of us. I stayed at the new City of Dreams complex and was gobsmacked by the scale of the enterprise. The complex includes a casino (world-class, not like our sleazy Goa operations), a mall and two separate hotels. I was at the Cinnamon Life hotel, which has over 600 rooms, and expected - let's be honest here - a room factory, given that much of the hotel's business comes from groups and conferences. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised by how the hotel seemed relaxed and spread out, but still super efficient. Elevators arrived in seconds, there were no crowds anywhere in the hotel, the lobbies (they have three) never seemed full and the service reached global luxury levels. Most impressive was the food-and-beverage operation. A modern Japanese restaurant run by a Nobu-trained chef was good enough to have been in Dubai or Bangkok. A Chinese restaurant had three expat chefs and authentic food. A New York-style steakhouse served fine Japanese beef. I chose to ignore the wagyu, deliberately went for the basic steak and was surprised by the quality of the cooking. A Mediterranean bistro was excellent. The wine list was better curated than the lists at even the best Indian hotels, and the bars served every rare single malt whisky I could think of. And the best part was that all of it cost less than it would have in an Indian hotel. It's not difficult to see why tourists claim that even in the luxury sector, Sri Lanka offers astonishing value for money. Sri Lanka has more to offer than just the expense factor. Colombo is a charming town. The Lankans are a friendly people. The infrastructure is good. They have sorted things out at the airport, so customs and immigration are a breeze. The highways are smooth and distances are not great. The food of Lanka's many communities is varied and delicious. And while the beach resorts are less luxurious than say, Cinnamon Life, they are getting there. Are there lessons for India in general? Yes, of course. But there are more specific lessons for our states. Why can't Kerala replicate Sri Lanka's success? It looks a lot like Sri Lanka and the food is as good. Why don't Rajasthan, with its palaces, and UP, home of the Taj, make more of their advantages? I have become accustomed to India being beaten in the tourism game by South East Asia. But by Sri Lanka? It does make you pause and think, doesn't it?...