Remembering Gandhi: Honoring His Timeless Principles

Coming 2^nd of October 2019 will mark Mahatma Gandhi's 150^th birth anniversary. Mahatma Gandhi had a vision for this great nation for which he relentlessly worked when alive. As we step into the year of his 150^th birth anniversary, we at Quantum AMC seek to draw inspiration from the principles laid down by the Father of our nation, these principles when if carefully adopted can lead us to attain our goal of sustainable development. In our previous article, we touched upon Gandhi's principles of growth and equality. In this article we talk about the importance of financial freedom.

Freedom can mean different things to different people. The freedom to choose, the freedom to exercise one’s rights, the freedom to live life on one’s own terms, all mean something to someone. However, a common vein running through all of this is “self-dependence”. Self-dependence gives one the strength to not only claim but also enjoy their freedom. Gandhiji was well aware of the power of “self-dependence” and started an entire movement tethered to it.

Spinning for Independence
In 1918, Mahatma Gandhi started his movement for Khadi as a relief programme for the poor masses living in India's villages. Spinning and weaving was elevated to an ideology for self-dependence and self-government. Every village shall plant and harvest its own raw-materials for yarn, every woman and man shall engage in spinning and every village shall weave whatever is needed for its own use. Gandhiji believed that a small thing as the spinning of a basic necessity would cascade and have big ramifications for the country, eventually leading it to economic independence. It’s been 71 years since we achieved freedom from the British reign and next year we celebrate Mahatma’s 150^th birth anniversary. India is an economic powerhouse and Indians are independent. However, are we truly independent?

Independence in the 21^st Century
Today, independence is equated with financial freedom. The increasing ability to earn money has made more than a million Indians self-reliant. However, financial independence should not stop at just earning money. In order to maintain this independence one must also learn to save and invest these hard earned earnings. It is only then that an individual can be truly financially independent and self-reliant.

Savings and Investments – Two sides of the same coin
Intelligent budgeting and management of one’s income and expenses lies at the core of savings. We have all heard of the saying “a penny saved is a penny earned”. Budgeting is an important tool for saving. First, you need to take stock of your income and expenses. Once that is done, you need to prioritise your expenses from the most important to the least important. This is done to ensure that you always have enough income to meet your most important expenses while shedding light on expenses that can be avoided or curtailed. The eventual goal is to ensure that your income exceeds your expenses with as wide a margin as possible. The surplus fund after meeting all the expenses would be your savings. It is only after you have assured savings that you can think about investment.

Investment starts only after savings. It basically entails buying an asset with the money saved to generate returns from it over a period of time while also taking care of risk and volatility. When it comes to investing your hard earned money, you need to focus on a host of factors. These include your return requirement, your risk profile, the time horizon of your goals, your liquidity requirements and taxation. Start investing early and stay invested for a longer period of time so that you can allow the power of compounding to grow your wealth.

Some of the ways to ensure financially independence are:

1. Actively save every month. Some months it could be just a few hundred while the other months it could be half of your earnings. Make savings your priority by actively focusing on it.

1. Diversify your investments. Invest in long term equity and debt funds. Put some money in fixed deposits and a small amount to ensure liquidity.

1. Invest in a term insurance plan if you have a lot of EMIs still due or dependents to take care of.

1. Make sure you have retirement savings/systematic investment plans in place when you retire. This will help ensure that your life style does not dramatically reduce when you retire.

Always remember that you are the only one who can make you financially self-reliant. Start your journey of investments today to ensure a free and independent future.

Disclaimer, Statutory Details & Risk Factors:

The views expressed here in this article / video are for general information and reading purpose only and do not constitute any guidelines and recommendations on any course of action to be followed by the reader. Quantum AMC / Quantum Mutual Fund is not guaranteeing / offering / communicating any indicative yield on investments made in the scheme(s). The views are not meant to serve as a professional guide / investment advice / intended to be an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial product or instrument or mutual fund units for the reader. The article has been prepared on the basis of publicly available information, internally developed data and other sources believed to be reliable. Whilst no action has been solicited based upon the information provided herein, due care has been taken to ensure that the facts are accurate and views given are fair and reasonable as on date. Readers of this article should rely on information/data arising out of their own investigations and advised to seek independent professional advice and arrive at an informed decision before making any investments. Please visit – www.quantumamc.com/disclaimer to read scheme specific risk factors.

Above article is authored by Quantum.

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