India - Domestic Tourism Survey, July 2008 - June 2009, NSS 65th Round

Outline of sample design:
A stratified multi-stage design has been adopted for the 65th round survey. The first stage units (FSU) are the 2001 census villages (Panchayat wards in case of Kerala) in the rural sector and Urban Frame Survey (UFS) blocks in the urban sector. For towns with no UFS frame available (to be referred as 'non-UFS towns'), each town has been treated as an FSU. The ultimate stage units (USU) are households in both the sectors. In case of large FSUs, one intermediate stage of sampling is the selection of two hamlet-groups (hgs)/ sub-blocks (sbs) from each rural/ urban FSU.

Sampling Frame for First Stage Units:
For the rural sector, the list of 2001 census villages (the term 'village' means Panchayat wards for Kerala) has constituted the sampling frame. For the urban sector, the list of latest available UFS blocks has been considered as the sampling frame. For non-UFS towns, the list of towns as per Census 2001 has been the sampling frame.

Stratification for FSU:

Rural sector:
All villages of a district will form a separate stratum.

Urban sector:
In the urban sector, strata will be formed within each NSS region on the basis of size class of towns as per Census 2001 town population. This departure has been made in the stratification principle in order to facilitate generation of town-class wise estimates to satisfy the requirements of the user ministries. The stratum numbers and their composition (within each region) are given below.

Stratum Composition (within NSS region)
1 All towns with population < 50,000
2 All towns with population 50,000 - 99,999
3 All towns with population 1,00,000 - 4,99,999
4 All towns with population 5,00,000 - 9,99,999
5, 6, …. Each million plus city

The non-UFS towns, if any, within an NSS region will be grouped together to form separate urban strata as per the size classes (in terms of population).

Sub-stratification:
There has been no sub-stratification in the rural sector and for strata corresponding to non-UFS towns.

Total sample size (FSUs):
12928 FSUs for central sample and 13996 FSUs for state sample have been allocated at all-India level.

Allocation of total sample to States and UTs:
The total number of sample FSUs is allocated to the States and UTs in proportion to population as per census 2001 subject to a minimum sample allocation to each State/ UT. While doing so, the resource availability in terms of number of field investigators has been kept in view.

Allocation of State/ UT level sample to rural and urban sectors:
State/ UT level sample is allocated between two sectors in proportion to population as per census 2001 with 1.5 weightage to urban sector subject to the restriction that urban sample size for bigger states like Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu etc. should not exceed the rural sample size. A minimum of 4 FSUs is allocated to each state/ UT separately for rural and urban areas. Further the State level allocations for both rural and urban have been adjusted marginally in a few cases to ensure that each stratum gets a minimum allocation of 4 FSUs.


There was no deviation from the original sampling design.


Two different weights have been provided in each file in the data set. Details are as follows:-

1. Weight for each sub sample is stored in the variable name: Wgt_SubSample
2. Combined subsample weight is stored in the variable name: Wgt_Combined