But with India"s living costs soaring, he is nowforced to dip into his savings and will need to keep working longer just to payfor medicine, travel and household expenses.
"I can"t even think about retired life," hetold Reuters at a postal bank, where he had come to withdraw funds.
Wali has cut back on fruit, eating out and visits torelatives. He estimates his income is now less than half what it was beforeCOVID-19 struck, with clients unable to pay what they did before the pandemicand his savings yielding less interest in inflation-adjusted terms.
While better off than many his age, inflation hasforced Wali and millions of other elderly Indians to make tough choices.
Sharply rising prices are hitting older people theworld over as global supply problems caused by the pandemic -- and made worseby the Ukraine war -- propel food and fuel costs higher.
In India, meagre state pensions mean only a minorityof retirees can afford proper healthcare with nearly 15 million of those aged60 and above - around 10% of the total - nearly homeless.
India"s headline inflation hit an eight-year high of7.79% in April.
Food items, which account for nearly half of theconsumer price index, have jumped, with wheat, edible oil, vegetables, fruits,meat and tea up by between 10% and 25% in a year. Cooking gas and petrol pricesclimbed more than 40%.
"Inflation is the biggest blow to olderpeople," said Anupama Datta, director at the HelpAge India charity, whichestimates that nearly 90 million of 138 million people aged 60 years or moreare working in order to earn enough to live on.
India"s central bank warns elevated inflation willpersist at least until September.
DIPPING INTO SAVINGS
Many Indian pensioners rely on savings built overdecades for their retirement.
There are no official estimates but pensioners"associations said many they represent are now forced to draw more from thoseaccounts than previously.
India"s gross savings rate is estimated to have fallento below 30% of GDP in the fiscal year ended March, from over 32% before thepandemic. Economists do not expect that to change next year.
Average interest rates on long-term deposits have alsofallen to 6% from 8.5% over the past three years, taking it below headlineinflation.
Some pensioners have switched to riskier investments,including equities and mutual funds, but after two good years of returns evenstocks are now struggling with the benchmark index .NSEI down over 6% thisyear.
India"s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) concededthat the elderly have been particularly hard hit by inflation.
Gopal Krishna Agarwal, the BJP"s economic affairsspokesman, said the government was doing all it could to protect them,including through food and healthcare support.
It already provides free food grain to nearly 800million people as a part of its pandemic relief programme.
Over the weekend the government announced tax changesand subsidies that will lower prices of gasoline, diesel and cooking gas.
But it is not clear how much relief that will bring.State pensions are just 200 Indian rupees ($2.58) a month, although some statesprovide up to between 1,000-2,000 rupees monthly.
In the eastern city of Kolkata, Gita Sen, a70-year-old widow of a labourer, said she could not afford even two meals a dayon her 1,000 rupee monthly pension.
"Often I have to borrow or beg neighbours forfood," she said in front of her rented one-room home in a slum.
CARE CRUNCH
Unlike advanced economies, India has very fewaged-care homes. Most retirees depend on families for support, putting extrastrain on children whose livelihoods have been impacted by the pandemic and nowinflation.
There were just 1,100 old age homes across the countrycatering to about 100,000 people before COVID-19 struck, according to a studyby Tata Trusts, the charitable arm of the Tata Group conglomerate.
Largely run on private donations, they face their ownchallenges as costs soar. Increases in food, medicine and energy costs meanthese homes have less to spend on vegetables, fruit, drugs and care providers.
Saurabh Bhagat, director at SHEOWS, a Delhi-basedcharity that runs three such homes catering to more than 400 people, saidmonthly expenses had recently gone up by nearly 20%.
"We can"t think about buying fruit any more, andhave cut down expenses on food supplements that is delaying the recovery ofsick people at our old age homes," Bhagat said.
He added that the homes he runs were bringing in 30-40elderly people a month off Delhi"s streets who had been abandoned by theirfamilies, almost triple last year"s rate.
Basanti Chand, 61, a resident at one of the SHEOWShomes, said she had been abandoned by her family, even though she had spenteverything from her savings to make ends meet.
She had sold off her small house earlier in order topay the dowries of four daughters.
"I would not have survived today if the home hadnot given me shelter," she said, wiping tears from her eyes. Chand did notblame her children.
"I can"t think anything bad about them. Afterall, they are my children ... who have their own problems."
