The cost of home-cooked vegetarian and non-vegetarian thalis increased significantly in November as festival demand pushed up vegetable prices and erratic rains led to lower output in the kharif season. The average cost of preparing a thali at home is calculated based on input prices prevailing throughout India. Onion, tomato and pulses are the fundamental ingredients of an Indian thali and they have a meaningful bearing on the daily expenses of the average Indian. These commodities have seen a rise in prices in the past few weeks. Thalinomics is an indigenous attempt to quantify food price inflation based on what a common person pays for a thali across India, and it does reveal some important socio-economic insights. Its underlying implications should not be ignored.

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