INDIA - Survey on Health Care July - June 1995-96, NSS 52nd Round

Household : A group of persons normally living together and taking food from a common kitchen will constitute a household. The members of a household may or may not be related by blood to one another Household size : The number of normally resident members of a household is its size. It will include temporary stairways but exclude temporary visitors and guest.

The determination of the actual composition of a household will be left to the judgment of the head of the household, the following procedures will be followed as guidelines : (I) In deciding the composition of a household, more emphasis is to be placed on 'normally living together' than on 'ordinarily taking food from a common kitchen'. In case the place of residence of a person is different from the place of boarding, he or she will be treated as a member of the household with whom he or she resides. (ii) A resident employee, or domestic servant, or a paying guest (but not just a tenant in the household) will be considered as a member of the household with whom he or she resides even though he or she is not a member of the same family. (iii) When a person sleeps in one place (say, in a shop or a room in another house because of space shortage) but usually takes food with his or her family, he or she should be treated not as a single member household but as a member of the household in which other members of his or her family stay. (iv) If a member of a household (say, a son or a daughter of the head of the household) stays elsewhere (say, in hostel for studies or for any other reason) he/she will not be considered as a member of his/her parent's household. However, he/she will be listed as a single member household if the hostel is listed.