Two needs which need maximum attention and planning from parents (especially modern day parents) are higher education and marriage. Within no time, parents realise that their tiny tots have grown up and it’s time for them to decide future course of their life in terms of profession they want to take. Funding for your children’s education and wedding is one of the most valuable gifts you can give them and it is possible for you to do it in the most uncompromising way. Look at the figures below to get an idea of what could be the expenses like when you start to plan.

Currently the average cost of professional courses like Bachelor’s in Engineering in India in a Govt-funded college is around Rs 50,000 per year (this figure may differ from college to college and from one state to another). Add to that other expenses like tuition fees and miscellaneous expenses and the cost per year could very easily be around Rs 100,000. It could be upto Rs 2.5 Lakhs a year if the child stays away in another city for this education. 10 years down the line, this figure might well be Rs 5.5 lakhs per year due to inflation (considered at a reasonable 8% per year) and it could be about Rs 8.0 Lakhs per year 15 years later. If the college is private-funded, multiply the figure by 3-4 times, and if you are more ambitious and are looking at any of the world’s top universities, further multiply the figure by 2-3 times more!! And this is the cost of one year of education out of the 4-5 years’ total education.

The other event that assumes equal, if not more, importance is the wedding of your children. A back of the envelope calculation reveals that monetary requirement for wedding will certainly not be less than what you may need for higher education. In fact, a normal, dowry-less marriage for a daughter today would cost Rs 20 Lakhs while for the son too, it would be Rs 6 Lakhs. 10 years down the line, these figures become 43 lakhs and 13 lakhs respectively.