Price rise makes weddings a pale affair

HYDERABAD: With inflation becoming an all-pervading evil, the effect has also been felt on the big fat Indian wedding. Weddings are important events for every Indian family and in most cases a major portion of one’s savings is kept aside for the ceremony. However, with increasing prices for the past six months, weddings and their business have gone pale, say caterers and owners of wedding halls. Trilok Chandan, a research scholar in the University of Hyderabad who took care of arrangements for his sister’s wedding a couple of days back says they had to shell out `36,000 on a medium-sized wedding hall and about `1.5 lakh for food alone. “We had to drop ice cream from the menu as ice cream and fruits together would be very expensive,” says Trilok adding, “My sister’s wedding was scheduled for June when the price of gold was `23,000. Now it is `29,000 and we were forced to buy fewer ornaments. Needless to say, clothes are also expensive.”Weddings haven’t been joyous for businessmen either. “Of late, I haven’t seen a single customer pleased to be arranging a wedding. All have a story of woe and hence we have begun discounting the rent by around 40 percent,” says Nasar Khan of Meridian Function Plaza. He says things have been difficult having to pay labourers and the number of events going down. “Usually, we charge about `25,000 but we have begun discounting the rent,” said Nasar. The Telangana protests have also created a dampener. While earlier, the function hall hosted about 30 functions a month, it has now come down to 15. He hopes business would pick up after Moharrum. Quader, manager of Sridhar Function Plaza echoes a similar view saying both price hike and T-bandhs have affected their business. On the other hand, there is a section untouched by the inflation. “I am catering to a wedding at Taramati Baradari next week. My customer is spending `30,000 on china cutlery which is only a part of the arrangements for food,” says Faheem, who owns Sham’s Caterers. He adds weddings are indeed a challenging task for the common man.