Although the Dhanteras sentiment still holds strong among Indians, consumers seem to have downscaled their gold and silver purchase on this day.

Lightweight jewellery and silver articles seems to be the flavour this festive season, thanks to rising gold prices. And jewellers are now innovating with manufacturing technology and jewellery patterns to create lightweight jewellery and increase inventory to cater to demands on Dhanteras - a day considered auspicious to buy jewellery and precious metals.

“Lightweight bangles and chains are in demand and we have brought down minimum weights of gold and diamond bangles from 40 to 37 grams this year, and minimum weights of other smaller jewellery pieces from 12 to eight grams,” Mr Vinod Hayagriv, Managing Director, C. Krishniah Chetty & Sons (CKC) told Business Line.

Also, CKC has increased collections of smaller, lightweight pieces from 20 to 40 per cent of the stock this year, he added.

However, the company doesn't expect growth in overall sales over the previous year during the festive season due to high gold prices.

“We will maintain sales like last year but don't expect growth in sales unlike last year when we grew 20 per cent over the previous year,” Mr Hayagriv said.

Mr Rajesh Mehta, Chairman of Shubh Jewellers, the retail venture of Rajesh Exports Ltd, said “The quantum of sales of lightweight jewellery, which is the trend of the market today, has gone up 70 per cent.”

He said that despite high prices of gold, Shubh stores across the country saw an increase in sales including a few odd demands for heavy jewellery.

While Bhima Jewellers also saw an increase in demand for lightweight jewellery this Dhanteras and has consequently increased stock of lightweight pieces by 30 per cent, it saw an increase in demand for silver articles this year.

“The sales, in value terms, is the same as last year, but we have seen more people asking for silver articles and gold/silver coins compared to jewellery,” Mr Sripathi Bhat, Manager of Bhima Jewellery's M.G. Road branch here told Business Line.

Mr Samir Shah, Vice President, Riddisiddhi Bullions Ltd, said that the expectations this year was an increase in demand for bullions. “Since prices of gold jewellery are increasing, we expect people to buy bullion rather than gold as they can save money on making charges,” he said.

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