New Year’s On A Budget... Can You Still Have Fun With Just Rs 1,000?

There are some things money can’t buy. If the Beatles are to be believed, love is one of them. Merrymaking on New Year’s is another question altogether, depending on who you ask.

If you’re planning to hit the town on New Year’s eve, and bring in the new year like the high flyers, chances are you will have to shell out an eye watering amount. Ronak Rochlani, a Mumbai-based event and party planner, says parties in the city could cost between Rs 3,000-5,000 at the very least and goes up to as much as Rs 2 lakh a table.

He isn’t aware of any parties that you can get into for Rs 1,000.

So, the question then is, can you still have fun on New Year’s eve if you’re on a shoe string budget? We decided to get in touch with people we’d spoken to over the past year, and also some people on the street street on what they thought we could do with Rs 1,000 each.

Ramdas Karvande, one of Mumbai’s famous dabbawallas, invited us to drop by for a nice home cooked meal.

Happiness Is The State Of Your Stomach

There were many, though, that said they’d spend most of the Rs 1,000 on their favourite eats. The best thing to do, they said, would be to go to a street, like Carter Road in Bandra, and sample the best that the establishments there have to offer.

If you do go to Carter Road, you’ll find everything from milkshakes to shawarma and butter chicken. One of the people we spoke to said she’d spend her entire Rs 1,000 on “butter chicken pizza”.

We even got a message from Michelin starred chef Sriram Aylur all the way from London.

Travelling On A Budget

If you’ve decided that you’d like to take a gander on New Year’s, try the new air conditioned suburban trains. They aren’t as frequent as one would like, but they’re affordable, and very comfortable. The unfortunate part is that they’re currently only on Mumbai’s western line.

The ticket to Bandra from Churchgate cost us Rs 85 each.