Candles

Candles  lend elegance to any setting and are still a staple for romantic dinners !
All said and done are candles really taking a backseat nowadays? Much is being said about air pollution  and candle sales have dropped down to alarming levels specially in Metro cities. People prefer to buy cheap imported electric lights for festivals and use them year after year. Apartment culture has also contributed to this new fad as placing candles and diyas in narrow balconies is dangerous and foolhardy.
Thankfully smaller towns with spacious dwellings still love candles and decorate their houses during Diwali with these colorful wax beauties. Many people still make candles and make good sales round the year.
Candles are generally smoke free and soot less but this depends on procuring good quality of wax. Most of the bad publicity is due to the inferior quality of imported wax flooding the market. Cheap inferior wax is hurting the candle industry as it makes for an inferior product.Many candle makers feel that wax quality has gone down drastically and has affected the popularity of candles.Good high quality wax is comparatively expensive and difficult to find unlike a few years ago when a buyer had a choice between high quality wax and others.
Candles are still the most  trustworthy backups in case the electricity plays hide and seek.Its rare to find a person who has not studied in candle light and burnt the midnight oil!