Beyond gold and silver, Dhanteras has become the single most important day of the year for a wide range of major Indian consumer purchases, with automobile dealerships, electronics retailers and appliance stores all reporting their highest single-day sales volumes of the year concentrated on this date, since the belief that a major purchase made on Dhanteras carries particular auspiciousness has extended well past the traditional emphasis on precious metal to essentially any significant household acquisition a family can time to the date.
Car manufacturers and dealerships in particular now plan production, inventory and staffing specifically around the expected Dhanteras sales surge, and Indian financial media report national vehicle and consumer durable sales figures for the day as a widely followed indicator of household consumer confidence for the upcoming year, a striking instance of a religious belief about the auspicious timing of new acquisition reshaping the operational calendar of entire modern retail and manufacturing industries rather than remaining confined to the household shrine or the jewellery counter.
India's Ministry of AYUSH formally designated Dhanvantari Trayodashi as National Ayurveda Day in 2016, giving the medical dimension of Dhanteras a specific annual government observance of its own, marked with conferences, health camps and public messaging promoting Ayurvedic medicine nationwide, run alongside, and separately from, the retail and jewellery-buying customs that dominate popular observance of the day.