Most committees track expenses as a list of payments. That tells you what you spent. It does not tell you what you spent it on — which is the only version of the question anyone actually asks. Categories are the difference, and they cost nothing except deciding them once.
A category list that covers most Indian festivals
Start here and adapt. The goal is a list short enough that volunteers pick the right one without thinking, and specific enough to be useful in a comparison.
- Idol / pratima — including transport and immersion
- Mandap / pandal — structure and setup
- Decoration — flowers, drapes, backdrop
- Lighting — rental, electrician, power
- Sound & stage — system, operator, cultural programme
- Pooja — purohit, samagri, aarti items
- Prasad & food — mahaprasad, bhog, catering
- Security & permits — police permission, municipal charges, guards
- Printing & publicity — banners, invitations, receipts
- Miscellaneous — the honest home for everything else
Why consistency beats precision
It matters far less whether “flowers” sits under Decoration or Pooja than whether it sits in the same place every year. The value of a category appears in year two, when you can open last year and see that the same lighting work cost ₹18,000 — and walk into the vendor meeting with that number.
Keep the list stable. Renaming categories every year quietly destroys your own history.
Make “Miscellaneous” small
A healthy festival has under 5% in miscellaneous. If a quarter of your spending is uncategorised, your categories are wrong — or your volunteers are picking the fastest option rather than the right one. Both are fixable; neither fixes itself.