Many say world doesn’t revolve around sun but it revolves around money. One of the most actively surfed term in spite of world cups, tsunamis and any other major events happening around the world are keywords like earning money online, how to become rich etc. People fight against each other for sake of money. People study hard enough just because to earn money. Family disputes are more common among middle class families because of money. As per the Census report of 2011 India has crossed the population mark of more than 1.21 billion people. I just want to share few facts about where people in India spend most of their hard earned money.
1. Marriage: India is famous for its traditional culture where they believe marriage is one of the sacred issues of life. They feel it is a one time event in ones life and had to be done in a special way which pleases their friends and relatives. If a family saves or spends most of the money they earned is only for this purpose. Many middle class families even take loans and sell their belongings for this one time event i.e marriage. Though many were there to fight against dowry practices but in vain this is a common practice in present day society. And surprisingly people in India spend most of the money in marriages. You can imagine the expenditure behind celebrating a marriage occasion.
2. Liquor: A business which can turn a person into millionaire over night is liquor business. Unfortunately in India these shops are raising day by day as most of the people under poverty line to above the line are indulged in drinking. Despite of the different classes in the society a special occasion is usually celebrated by a drink party after it. Poor and middle class people struggle hard for income out of which they spend most of it on liquor in order to forget there worries so one of the commodities where people spend most of their hard earned income is Liquor. Even many dont have the habit of drinking but still on an average it is also one of the most spent item in nowadays society.
3. Housing: An own house is a dream of every individual in this world. Many people in India are still making their lives easy in a rented house. Mostly people spend their earned income in paying off their rents, current bills etc. Else they also spend in building a house and nevertheless have to pay house tax, water tax, maintenance, etc. People indulge in paying loans which they have taken to build their houses.
4. Electronics: Nine out of ten houses in India has a television set whether it is black and white or plasma. Need for communication has created a new era in the field of mobile technology. It is becoming common for a person to maintain a cell phone these days. Some people even don’t leave their cell phone, it has become a basic necessity like roti, kapada, makan aur cell phone. Rise of cell phones, digital cameras, laptops etc has created a tremendous advancement in the field of electronic goods. So it is not a surprise that most people in India are spending their money on electronic goods. No wonder it may top the list in few years as new advancements are being rapidly implemented in this field.
5. Education: Past decade rise of techno schools, IIT foundation institutes, coaching centers and professional colleges has raised drastically. All people want to send their children to top institutes and they spend their money on their children’s education. As the population is increasing and demand for jobs are also at high, people in order to sustain their chances of settling their child also increased. So in order to make them study in good institutes they spend money on private institutes, tutions, coaching's and even people who are rich enough spend on NRI seats and so. Even an uneducated person sees that his child is being educated at least with 10 + 2 so that they can do a white collar job. Though some parts of the country is still far behind literacy rate most people spend there money on education. Not to say the bad side, the demand of education also helped rise of many consultancies to earn their live hood by sending people abroad. Certain institutes which produce fake certificates etc has also came into existence. Education is all for our stomach is a common saying in India. Literacy rate in India has increased to 74.04 percent which was 64.83 in 2011.
6. Health: As the population is increasing the diseases are also increasing. An average aged person is prone to diabetes, blood pressure etc. As the demand for resources are increasing the quality of the stuff available around is degrading. Milk is being sold by mixing it with water, vegetables are being grown quicker and in order to make them stay for long many fertilizers and chemicals are used. Result of doing such things is a sick nation. At least 1 to 2 people in a family suffer from common ailments like diabetes where the patient has to depend on drugs through out their life. So people spend most of their spent money on their doctor bills and pharmacy bills to make themselves stay alive and healthy.
7. Savings & Loans: People in India also have a major hand in savings like paying chit funds, mutual funds, recurring deposits, Insurance, etc. Some of the categories discussed above like marriage, house, education needs lot of money where most people take loans from bank and spend their remaining life in clearing these loans. Loans are also given in many areas like vehicle loan, education loan, etc. People often fulfill their requirements by taking loans.
8. Groceries:shopping has become so easy after advanced shopping complexes and multiplexes have come into play almost all major cities have big shopping complexes. This trend may follow into many near by cities which is a indication of soon urbanization of our country. Reliance group of industries introduced Reliance fresh a shopping complex where we can buy variety of vegetables and also products under various categories like food, cosmetics, almost everything like a wholesale shop. To see a list of shopping centers and malls present in India you can browse it in wikipedia.
9. Festivals:India being rich in multi religions is also not far behind celebrating festivals. It has festivals almost every month. May be all people may not spend their money at a time on all festivals but they definitely celebrate one festival as a major festival and every one in the family will buy new clothes, inviting friends and cooking some special dishes. So celebrating a festival has expenditures on shopping, cooking, traveling etc.
10. Traveling: People in India do a lot of traveling as they move from one place to another the use of road transport and rail transport has been playing a major role in transportation. If a person needs to go to a pilgrimage place or plan to go to tour or a business meeting or visiting relatives they need to go off traveling far places. Many people get jobs far places away from his residence so they need to travel. These days rise of multinational companies in major cities made lot of people from all parts of the country to join them and it needs traveling.
11. Entertainment:Movies, serials, game shows, reality shows etc are also in major demand these days. Weekend recreation for most of the people is to go for a movie. Daily entertainment for most of the housewives is a daily serial. If a reality show is going on in channel they ask for voting through sms and almost every show has been keeping this voting through sms. Also many companies have launched their own cable networks like dish tv, Airtel DTH, Big tv etc so popularity of media is on high these days. World cup almost made many people to stick on to their television sets. So people in India also spend much on entertainment.
12. Others: Speaking of other things there are still many areas where people do spend their money on various activities like recreation, shopping, restaurants, gyms, petrol, religious activities, beauty parlors, parties, etc
These are only major areas where most people in India spend their money. I haven’t done any special survey on it but have written based on the observations happening around. Correct statistics can only be given based on a strict survey.
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