By Aashish Mishra
Lalitpur, Mar. 12 ; It’s always party season in Nepal. There is always an occasion to celebrate, be it weddings, coming-of-age ceremonies, birthdays, family congregations, college/office parties – you name it and people celebrate it. And all these celebrations are occasions when party venues make hay.
Nepal’s growing middle class has developed quite a taste for lavish celebrations and hence, they go out of their way to mark special family occasions as extravagantly as possible. But this extravagance is not easy to pull off. There are so many elements one needs to think of, so many variables that need to be fixed in place, things like catering, drinks, entertainment (most often music), arrival of guests and proper parking facilities for the vehicles they bring – everything needs to be attended to. That is why people are choosing party venues to hold their special events in.
“Private houses cannot accommodate the hundreds of people that are invited to these functions,” Sanju Pradhan, who recently held a wedding party for her sister, explained. “The guests bring cars and motorcycles which can’t just be parked on the road but they don’t fit inside the house premises either.” But the main concern Sanju pointed out is, “Who is going to clean up afterwards?” So, all these considerations made her and her family decide to hold the wedding and the reception at the Crystal Banquet, Manbhawan, Lalitpur.
Jaya Manandhar also held her nephew’s wedding reception at the Banquet last year. Her reason for choosing it was to lighten her shoulders. “In the hustle and bustle of a wedding, you don’t really have time to be thinking about the party and the guests,” she said, remarking how choosing a party palace allows families to focus on the event at hand. “In a party palace, you tell them your needs, you select your preferred menu, give the details like the party date, time, duration and the estimated number of guests and your work is done.”
When asked if the same thing couldn’t be done at home, she added, “Nobody holds parties at home anymore; that trend is now over.”
Him Kishor Rai, manager of Crystal Banquet, said that the main reasons for people opting for party palace were space and convenience. “We have enough space for the many people they invite and we take care of everything as per their request.”
But this comfort comes at a cost. The Banquet charges between Rs. 600 to Rs. 900 per plate depending on the menu plus additional cost for services like DJ, Face Painting, Hukkah, etc. Rai also explained that the party holders could select from a wide assortment of veg and non-veg food items to place in their menu and they get to taste the food beforehand and demand any changes.
Pradhan and Manandhar detailed that party palaces had altered from a luxury to a necessity. People don’t choose such establishments for convenience but rather out of compulsion. “Families have become small and we don’t have many relatives to help us with the work,” Pradhan said. Manandhar added, “Even if we have all the facilities in the house itself, everyone holds their events in party venues and hotels so we are forced to do the same; it is just what the trend is.”
And this trend is gradually expanding beyond parties as Rai explained. “People are now hosting their entire wedding ceremony from our facilities instead of just the reception.” He further added, “People are also booking us for events like college welcome and farewell parties, organisations’ general assemblies, office meetings and contract signings, Guthi feasts and family gatherings.”
While Rai is happy with the income these diverse range of events and functions accrue, he did however hold reservations about some specific events. “People have started contacting us for holding yearly rites for the deceased (Shraddha) and while we don’t turn them away, it is sad to see people prefer convenience over customs and rituals,” he said.
As per Rai, with one event or the other being held all the year around, the party palace business is going steady in Kathmandu Valley and is slowly catching up in other urban centres outside the capital as well. But, at the same time, competition is also growing.