India - Household Consumer Expenditure: NSS 50th Round, Schedule 1, July 1993 - June 1994

01 Birth
02 Birthday
03 Head Shaving / Mundan
04 Annaprasan / First rice taking
05 Thread ceremony
06 Marriage
07 Marriage anniversary
08 Death
09 Other (Specify)

Ceremonies are performed to solemnize notable events of life e.g. birth, marriage etc. Members of a household may have to perform some religious rites consequent upon the death a person. For various religious faiths, there are some days in a year which are observed with ceremonial performanc­es like offering of puja, prayer, celebration of rituals etc. Such ceremonies may be performed by household members as required under the social/religious customs without incurring any expendi­ture for entertaining guests. On the other hand, households may have to spend something under different heads for the purpose of entertainment. Conventionally these expenditures are considered as essential part of the ceremonies performed by them. The purpose of providing this block in this schedule is to estimate the no. of meals served to guests during ceremonies performed by the household in the last 30 days preceding the date of enquiry as also the meals serves to guests and employees (non-members only) on any other occasion (other than ceremonies) and also to estimate the amount of expenditure incurred by the household on these occasions under various broad groups of items e.g. food, clothing & footwear, misc. goods & services, durable goods etc. Hence only those ceremonies on which some amount of expenditure is involved should be listed in this block.