Abstract
The present paper primarily aims to capture the changing pattern of food and non-food consumption expenditure in the rural and urban India. India’s faster economic growth over 1990s has risen per capita income (expenditure) and has significantly impacted its food consumption patterns by causing a change in the structure of food consumption patterns observed earlier during pre-reform period. In contrast to what is generally held that differences in consumption of necessaries across India decline more as the economy grows. Furthermore, in the cases of most of the food and non-food items, especially, education and medical services the consumption expenditure in real terms is showing an upward trend. On the basis of National Sample Survey data on consumer expenditure, this paper examines empirical evidence on the nature and extent of long-term changes in consumption patterns of various groups at the household level in rural and urban India. The percentage share of Monthly Per Capita Expenditure (MPCE) on food items in total aggregate consumption expenditure had declined from 51.7 per cent in 1987-88 to 48.4 per cent at the end of the pre-reform period. In the post reform period also, the food expenditure had declined from 49.9 per cent in 1991-92 to 34.1 per cent in 2011- 2012. Whereas expenditure pattern on non-food items showed a steady growth rate in both the reform periods.