TRAVEL to India may have dropped by as much as 25% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013, according to a survey of 1,200 tour operators conducted by the Associated Chambers of Commerce & Industry of India. The problem, says the group, is that many travellers, and especially women, feel less safe going to India in the wake of the fatal gang rape in Delhi that attracted worldwide attention in December. Even some of the positive effects of the fallout from the murder—a dramatic rise in the reporting of sex crimes, for example—are likely to deter foreigners from visiting.

Travel and tourism are big businesses in India, supporting more jobs in 2011 than the country's much-vaunted communications sector, according to a study by the World Travel and Tourism Council. Until recently, they were growing quickly, and indeed generated over 6% of India's GDP in 2011 while supporting tens of millions of jobs. It seems that one more result of this terrible crime is to remind the world's leaders that the seriousness with which they fight crimes against women can have a real impact on their countries' economic welfare.