About NostalgiaFlation

It started during Diwali 2023. I was helping my mother clean out my grandmother's old steel almirah in our family home in Lucknow. Between the faded silk sarees and bundled-up old photos, I found a small notebook — the kind with a brown paper cover and ruled pages. It was my grandmother's household expense diary from the 1980s.

One entry from 1985 read: "Monthly kharcha — ₹800." Everything. Groceries, milk, vegetables, cooking gas, school fees for two kids. Eight hundred rupees for an entire month. I was earning that much on a single Swiggy order in 2023.

That moment hit me hard. I'm a data person by training — I've spent years working with servers, databases, and cloud infrastructure. But those handwritten numbers in a faded notebook taught me more about economics than any textbook ever did. I started wondering: what if I could build something that shows people this gap? Not through dry CPI charts, but through real items they remember — the cost of chai, school fees, a movie ticket?

So I started collecting data. Evenings after work, weekends, late nights. I pulled official CPI numbers from the Reserve Bank of India and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I cross-referenced prices from old newspaper ads, government gazettes, and family memories. I talked to my father about what petrol cost when he bought his first scooter. I asked my mother about the price of atta when she got married in 1982.

NostalgiaFlation launched in early 2025 as a simple inflation calculator. But it grew — because people connected with it. They'd use the calculator and then message me: "Bhai, my father used to pay ₹2 for a haircut — show that!" Or: "Can you add gold prices? My mother always said gold was the best investment."

Today, the site has grown into a full platform with calculators for inflation, salary, college costs, and retirement planning. There are 18 blog posts telling real stories from real Indian families. And 18 tutorials that explain concepts like CPI, FD returns, and lifestyle inflation — all in plain language, no jargon.

I still update the data myself. I still write every article. And I still keep my grandmother's notebook on my desk. It reminds me why this matters.