Editor's note: This is a historical analysis, originally published in 2013, of the Himalayan Ski Village project in Kullu-Manali, Himachal Pradesh. The piece reflects the situation as it stood at that time. A concluding section has been added to examine how India's landmark Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act (RERA) 2016 has since changed the landscape for buyers caught in similarly distressed projects.
The Himalayan Ski Village was one of the most ambitious — and most contested — real estate ventures ever proposed in the Indian Himalayas. Planned for the slopes above Manali in Himachal Pradesh, it promised an international-standard ski resort capable of attracting high-spending tourism to a region that had long relied on budget domestic visitors. It also triggered one of the most complex multi-sided conflicts in Indian resort development: politics, environmental activism, local community concerns, and allegations of financial irregularity all became entangled with what its promoters insisted was simply a legitimate tourism project.
This article examines the principal forces that stalled the project, weighs the competing claims, and considers what lessons it offers for investors and developers in Indian mountain real estate.
The Political Dimension
Shortly after receiving state government approval, the project faced organised opposition from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), then in opposition in Himachal Pradesh. Multiple media reports at the time suggested that the hotel lobby in Kullu-Manali — a well-established and commercially powerful interest group — feared the project would cannibalise existing accommodation revenue, and that figures within that lobby were known to have close ties to senior BJP leaders.
The BJP's campaign took several forms. Perhaps the most striking was the convening of a gathering of local holy men, who pronounced that the region's deities were opposed to the development. Whether this represented sincere religious concern or politically convenient theatre was widely debated in the Himachal media.
The political dimension deepened further with questions about the project's relationship to the broader BJP-Congress rivalry of the period. The BJP's closeness to Yoga Guru Baba Ramdev was well known, and some commentators noted that the Congress state government's decision to cancel the lease of Ramdev's Patanjali Yogpeeth trust created a context in which BJP opposition to any Congress-backed project carried additional political charge.
The BJP vice president Ram Swaroop Sharma stated publicly that the Himalayan Ski Village "will never be tolerated," a position maintained even after the state government reiterated its support for the project.
Environmental and Ecological Concerns
The environmental case against the project was made most rigorously by Manshi Asher, an independent researcher who had spent more than a decade working on livelihood and environmental rights in the Himalayan region. Her research paper, Impacts of the Proposed Himalayan Ski Village Project in Kullu, Himachal Pradesh, became a reference document for both environmental groups and legal petitioners.
Asher's core argument was that the scale of the development — encompassing five-star, seven-star and four-star hotels, vacation homes, condominiums, chalets, gondolas, ropeways, restaurants, shopping malls and entertainment facilities across high forested slopes — would inevitably involve significant deforestation and profound disruption to local water systems.
The water issue was particularly acute. The project's environmental filings indicated that the development would draw 1,440 kiloliters of raw water per day from the Kothi Beas and Harnola Nalas — streams that served as the primary source of drinking and irrigation water for communities downstream. The prospect of that water being diverted or contaminated by chemicals used in artificial snow-making (despite the developer's initial assurances to the contrary) was a source of genuine alarm.
We spoke to Manshi Asher directly, and she outlined her findings:
Can you outline the main findings of your research regarding the Himalayan Ski Village?
Of course. The Executive Summary of the project indicates development of five, seven and four-star hotels, vacation homes, condos, chalets, gondolas, ropeways, restaurants, shopping malls and entertainment facilities. This scale of activity on high forested slopes would clearly involve deforestation. The company planned to tap raw water at 1,440 kiloliters per day from the Kothi Beas and Harnola Nalas — the main source of drinking and irrigation water for villages downstream. Villages also feared that chemicals used in artificial snow-making would pollute water sources. Customary forest rights of at least four villages would be affected. And the infrastructure burden on an already-strained Kullu-Manali road network would be severe.
The promoters argued the project would improve living conditions for local people. What is your response?
What do the locals have to gain? Petty jobs. Because the ownership lies with the company, not the locals. The current livelihood base — horticulture, agriculture, local tourism — is providing enough income. The vehement local opposition itself answers the question of whether the development was wanted.
Is there a middle path — environmental protection and project delivery?
No. This model of development is oriented towards profit-making for a corporation. That means using all resources — land, water, forests — to maximise returns. We have seen this model play out in many countries, including India. Local populations are almost always at the receiving end. This is not tourism; it is a real estate project dressed as tourism.
Was the stalling purely political?
Politics played a role, but there is more to it. Local opposition, environmental concerns, and questions raised about investors and possible FEMA regulatory violations all contributed to the stalling.
The Developer's Perspective
John Robert Sims, the American hotel developer and Managing Director of the Himalayan Ski Village project, took a diametrically different view. He argued that the development would create 4,000 jobs and bring world-class hospitality infrastructure — including a Six Senses resort — to a valley that had been largely by-passed by luxury tourism investment. The promoters had, he noted, already sent sixty young people to Finland for skiing training.
On the sensitive land acquisition question, Sims acknowledged in an interview with The New York Times that some land had been acquired at below-market prices, but maintained that those prices had been reached through negotiation. Critics argued that the power imbalance between an internationally-backed developer and subsistence farmers made such "negotiations" inherently unequal.
Legal Proceedings and a Stalled Project
In 2007, the Manali NGO Jan Jagran Avam Vikas Sansthan filed a petition in the Himachal Pradesh High Court seeking to scrap the project on environmental grounds, alleging that the state government had violated its own guidelines in granting approval. The petition kept the project in legal limbo for years.
Our view at the time, and it remains our view, is that the courts were the appropriate forum for resolving the genuinely contested factual and legal questions at the heart of this dispute. The environmental concerns were substantive and deserved rigorous examination. So too did the project's potential economic benefits for a region with genuine development needs. A project of this complexity required a transparent, evidence-based regulatory process — precisely the kind of process that India's real estate governance framework was, in 2013, poorly equipped to deliver.
What Happened Next: The Post-2013 Landscape
The Himalayan Ski Village project did not proceed as planned. Like many large-scale Indian real estate and resort developments of the 2010s that became embroiled in environmental, legal and political disputes, it effectively stalled. Buyers who had committed funds to similar distressed projects across India during this period found themselves in an extremely difficult position — with money committed, construction halted, and no clear legal mechanism to recover their investment.
The broader landscape of stalled Indian real estate projects in the 2010s became a systemic crisis. Hundreds of thousands of homebuyers across the country had paid in advance for properties that were never delivered, with limited legal recourse and promoters who were often shielded from accountability by the fragmented and developer-friendly regulations of the pre-reform era.
RERA 2016: How Buyer Protections Have Changed
The Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act (RERA), enacted in 2016 and progressively implemented across Indian states from 2017 onwards, represents the most significant structural reform in Indian real estate regulation in decades. Its provisions directly address the failures that allowed projects like the Himalayan Ski Village to take buyer funds without accountability.
The key protections RERA introduced include:
- Mandatory project registration: All residential and commercial real estate projects above a certain size must be registered with the state RERA authority before marketing or selling. Developers cannot accept funds without registration.
- Escrow requirements: Developers must deposit 70 per cent of project funds — including buyer advance payments — into a dedicated escrow account to be used only for construction and land costs. This directly addresses the problem of funds being diverted to other projects or personal use.
- Delivery timelines: Developers must commit to a specific delivery date. Delays trigger financial penalties and give buyers the right to a refund with interest.
- Carpet area standardisation: The definition of the area being sold is now standardised, eliminating many of the opaque pricing practices that had disadvantaged buyers.
- Fast-track adjudication: Each state RERA authority has its own adjudicating officer for disputes, providing a specialist forum with defined timelines rather than reliance on the overloaded civil court system.
- Developer accountability: Promoters face personal liability for project non-delivery, making it harder to walk away from failed projects without consequence.
The results have been imperfect but meaningful. Thousands of cases involving stalled projects have been brought before state RERA authorities. Some projects have been restarted under new management; others have resulted in partial refunds. For many buyers caught in the pre-RERA generation of distressed projects, however, full resolution remains elusive — the legal processes are slow, and the assets of failed developers are often insufficient to meet all liabilities.
For any buyer considering investment in Indian real estate today, verification of RERA registration is the absolute first step. A project without RERA registration is, in most circumstances, either exempt from the requirement (which applies to small developments) or operating outside the law. Neither situation offers adequate investor protection.
The Himalayan Ski Village episode is a reminder that in emerging markets, the gap between a project's promotional narrative and its regulatory and community reality can be very wide indeed. The best protection for a buyer is independent legal advice, RERA registration verification, and a clear understanding of the political and environmental context in which a development sits.