In the wake of the reported murder of 26-year-old businessman Ketan Agarwal, the fort experienced an unexpected influx of visitors. Many came not to appreciate its history or beauty, but to witness the gorge where Agarwal was allegedly pushed to his demise. Authorities reported an increase in visitors from around 1,000 to nearly 1,500 on holidays, with weekday attendance climbing from about 400 to over 600. The fort has since been temporarily closed to facilitate the police investigation.
This incident has reignited a larger question: why do people seek out locations linked to tragedy?
This phenomenon is referred to as dark tourism.
The term was coined by researchers John Lennon and Malcolm Foley in the 1990s to describe travel to sites associated with death, disaster, conflict, or suffering. Scholarly literature in the field of tourism also connects related concepts to “thanatourism,” a term introduced by A.V. Seaton (1996) that describes travel motivated by encounters—direct or symbolic—with death and mortality. Though the term is modern, the behavior it denotes has existed for a long time.
Historical accounts indicate that during the American Civil War, civilians sometimes gathered near battlefields to observe combat from a distance. Throughout various periods and regions, locations tied to conflict, death, and punishment have drawn public interest, often evolving into informal destinations on their own.
More than curiosity
At first glance, visiting places associated with tragedy might seem unsettling. However, academic research indicates that the motivations behind such visits are complex, layered, and often rooted in psychological factors.
A foundational concept in this area comes from Chris Rojek’s (1993) notion of “Black Spots,” which describes sites of public fascination where death or disaster has occurred. Rojek contends that these places capture visitors’ interest because they signify “moments of rupture” in collective memory.
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Building upon this, Seaton’s research on thanatourism (1996) and subsequent studies in tourism suggest that visiting such sites often serves as a means of meaning-making and awareness of mortality, where individuals confront death symbolically to better comprehend life and history.
An influential psychological framework is the Terror Management Theory (TMT), developed by social psychologists Jeff Greenberg, Sheldon Solomon, and Tom Pyszczynski (1986). This theory posits that awareness of death creates existential anxiety, which individuals handle through cultural worldviews and symbolic systems. Thus, visiting sites associated with death can serve as a way to grapple with mortality in a structured and socially acceptable context.
Another pertinent framework comes from tourism scholar Philip Stone (2006, 2012), who argues that dark tourism often functions as a form of “thanatological mediation,” where death is approached indirectly, enabling visitors to process challenging emotions from a safe psychological and physical distance.
In simpler terms, these studies indicate that dark tourism is not driven by a singular motive, but is influenced by a blend of historical learning, emotional engagement, existential reflection, and controlled exposure to fear and mortality.
This same intrigue is mirrored in the popularity of true crime narratives in books, films, documentaries, and podcasts, which continue to captivate global audiences. In India, crime and thriller genres have become significant components of streaming platforms’ offerings. According to Ormax Media, the Action, Crime, and Thriller (ACT) category constitutes about 43%–47% of new content released across major OTT platforms.
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Some of the most visited sites worldwide linked to tragedy have transformed into key places of remembrance.
Visitors come to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland to learn about and honor the victims of the Holocaust. In Italy, the ruins of Pompeii serve as a poignant reminder of an ancient Roman city buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.
The National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York pays tribute to the victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks. Robben Island in South Africa, where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 18 years, symbolizes the nation’s apartheid history. In Cambodia, the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center preserves the memory of those lost under the Khmer Rouge regime.
India too has numerous sites linked to painful historical events.
Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar commemorates the memory of the 1919 massacre during British rule. The Cellular Jail in Port Blair documents the imprisonment of Indian freedom fighters during colonial times. The Bhopal Memorial for the Victims of the Gas Disaster remembers those impacted by the 1984 industrial tragedy, while the Kargil War Memorial in Dras honors the soldiers who perished in the 1999 conflict.
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