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As the government and regulators try hard to convince the common man to invest in mutual funds, a large number of politicians, including Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Arun Jaitley, have already pumped in lakhs of rupees in these investment products.
Those having invested in mutual funds also include Varun Gandhi, Amar Singh, Shazia Ilmi, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Ambika Soni and Shashi Tharoor, as also new entrants on the political scene from other areas namely ex-banker Meera Sanyal, former Infosys executive V Balakrishnan, former India soccer team captain Bhaichung Bhutia and 'dream girl' Hema Malini.
An analysis of election affidavits filed by those fighting the ongoing Lok Sabha elections shows that a large number of contestants have invested significant amounts of money in mutual funds along with other investments.
Most of such contestants have invested lakhs of rupees in mutual funds while for a few, such investments run into crores of rupees.
At the same time, there are also those with mutual fund investments worth a few thousand rupees only, while those not having invested in these products include BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, Aam Aadmi Party's Arvind Kejriwal, BJP President Rajnath Singh, former Army Chief V K Singh, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and BJP's firebrand leader Uma Bharti.
Mutual funds provide for pooling of investments from various kinds of investors- including commoners, banks and corporates- for the collected money to be invested further in shares and bonds. The investors get returns as per the performance of the securities where this money is invested.
A total of 45 fund houses together manage assets worth Rs 9 lakh crore collected from various investors, but their penetration is very low, especially in smaller cities.
The government and regulator Sebi have been trying very hard for the past few years to push mutual funds as a preferred investment product among common investors, as the risks attached are said to be much lower in comparison to direct investments in shares or bonds.
Sebi is also finalising a new long-term mutual fund policy under which it has sought tax benefits for investors and expects to push the assets base of the sector to Rs 20 lakh crore within five years.
According to the election affidavit of Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi, he has over Rs 81 lakh in mutual funds while his mother and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi has above Rs 82 lakh in these products.
The election affidavits of the two Gandhis in the last Lok Sabha polls of 2009 did not show any mutual fund investments.
Amar Singh, the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) candidate from Fatehpur Sikri and a former SP leader, and his wife have assets worth about Rs 100 crore. The 58-year-old Singh has declared movable assets worth Rs 41.34 crore of which investment in mutual funds is worth Rs 6.27 crore.
