new delhi for delhi resident suman milind rising prices in india are casting a long shadow this year over the upcoming diwali festival of lightsthe 33yearold homemaker is tightening her purse strings and altering her spending habits thanks to soaring costs of fuel transport and many manufactured items coupled with stagnant incomes due to the pandemicearlier we used to get four or five boxes of dry fruits during festivals but now we hardly get one or two because of the high prices said milind adding that her family has reduced spending on food too by cutting back on meat to just once a week compared to several times a week earliermillions of households are facing similar strains on their budgets ahead of diwali which this year falls in early november and marks the countrys busiest shopping season for consumer goodsmany are foregoing bigticket purchases such as television sets and jewellery this festive season according to half a dozen people reuters spoke to and a consumer survey by mumbaibased consultancy axis my india threatening to slow an economy recovering strongly from the worst of covid19pump prices of petrol and diesel are up nearly 35 from a year ago and cooking gas by more than 50 severely hitting more than threequarters of households economists saidthe skyrocketing prices of petrol cooking gas are unbearable when our earnings are still down by nearly 30 from the prepandemic period said sultan singh tomar 53 who supplies incense sticks and kitchenware to shops in new delhi on his scooterhe said his petrol bill was up by rs 600 8 from a year ago and refilling the cooking gas cylinder was costlier by rs 400tomar is among millions of people working in the informal sector who dipped into savings during the pandemic and are now forced to pare back household spendingfor months consumerpricebased inflation stayed above the centralbanks comfort level of 6 driven by a rise in food pricesin september the consumer price index eased to 435 helped by a softening of food prices which make up nearly half of the index economists said that painted a better picture than what households are actually facingaccording to an october report by axis my india on consumer spending trends more than 88 of respondents in a survey said they will not be buying air conditioners televisions washing machines or jewellery this festival season and nearly half said they will make lowticket purchases such as clothesthere is not much that prime minister narendra modis government can do to alleviate the pain as global crude oil prices hit a threeyear high at 85 a barrel piling up the pressure on a country that imports 80 of its oilbidisha ganguly chief economist at industry chamber confederation of indian industries said the central and state governments should cut fuel taxes the highest among the major economies as higher fuel prices posed a risk of building up of medium term inflationary pressuresotherwise corporate earnings will be impacted in sectors where producers are unable to