MUMBAI — With its ultrachic restaurant and sweeping views of a 16th-century tomb, the Oberoi in New Delhi is a hotel of choice for the deal makers pouring into India.

But unless you planned your trip months ago, there is little chance of finding a vacancy. The 279 rooms and suites are fully booked almost every night until April at prices that start at $345 a night, breakfast not included.

Demand for hotel rooms is soaring in India as its economy blossoms. Foreigners are flooding in to cut deals, attend conferences or just discover the caves of Ajanta and the sands of Rajasthan. The rise of low-fare airlines is also bringing domestic air travel within reach of more Indians, who, until recently, had little chance of ever boarding a jet.

Yet for all those travelers, India offers only 110,000 hotel rooms. China has 10 times as many, and the United States 40 times as many. The New York metropolitan region alone has about as many rooms as all of India.