Groceries for the dead person or for the priest??

A week after my uncle's death, my dad was asked to perform the last rituals for him. The priest my cousins had arranged did not turn up on the D day. After many failed attempts in trying to reach him, my brother in law was able to get hold of another priest from a nearby temple. He came in with his helper and finished the ceremony in record time skipping most of the rituals.

No one complained since he was called in a hurry and did what best he could do in a short span of time.  

Since we had skipped some of the main rituals, we decided we would have to do a second one for my uncle at our home after a few days. My parents had immediately reached out to someone who could help with this. He provided the contact number of the priest who usually performed the ceremony. After consenting to perform the rituals, he came in to our place to share the list of items he needed for the ceremony. That is when the fun started. 

The items that was actually needed for the ceremony was a very small list (that was not that expensive as well).

On the other hand, the list he had made of items that had to be given to him as dhanam (offering) was a long one (around 45+ items) - 

• Around 11 vegetables (he crossed snake gourd from the list saying his wife does not usually cook them), 3 varieties of greens
• The usual varieties of fruits
• One veshti and mundu (he was specific of the brand, the length, the color and the design)
• One towel (again he was specific about the brand name)
• Ghee, butter, milk, honey
• Spices (atleast 4-5 varieties)
• Masala powders (sambhar, rasam, masala...)  
• Rice (5Kgs), different types of pulses (1Kg each), chillies, tamarind, salt (1Kg)
• Flour (wheat and rice)

He was very particular about the brands for each item except the vegetables and fruits😄

A whole two month grocery items, vegetables, fruits for his house.

I wondered why he did not include - soap, brush, toothpaste, washing powders, shampoo and other essentials to the list. That would have completed his shopping for the month.

It was so ridiculous that someone would ask these things with no inhibitions. If he does one ceremony per month, his groceries for that month would be taken care of. What was more surprising was that he insisted on not just the items but the brand names for almost all of them. And they were all top brands!!!

Guess what was the big question here - he does not give a receipt or bill for the money he takes for these rituals. In fact, none of them do so. 

No priest gives receipts or bills for the puja they do at anyone's house or for the ceremonies they conduct. 

Err, is this not income. Shouldn't they be paying income tax for this?? Most of them have a lot of money.

What happened finally - before my parents went out to purchase all the items in the list, my cousin called to say that they wanted to perform the rites in Kasi. We had to call him and cancel the whole thing.