Muthukrishnan Dhandapani

If past is any indicator, not much hope from Finance Minister.

Try buying a Mercedes with cash and no PAN details.

One key point people forget is lot of rich people have both accounted and unaccounted wealth. Since they are already rich officially, what is the point in counting them unofficially too?

The crux: Including corrupt people with wealth, not more than 1% of households in India is rich. Rich is defined as having $1 million (around Rs 10 crores) or more not including primary residence. Unaccounted wealth and income has two components- the hoarding part and the spending part. We saw how even only 4% of population regularly use Food Apps. Not more than 2% of India has ever traveled overseas. Not more than 4% of people regularly fly by air, 0.5% of the country only visit 5 star hotels, 0.1% of households only have luxury cars, only 1% of India own a sedan or above, only 6% of households have cars including hatchbacks, fine dining is limited to only 2% of households- show me where the consumption part of unaccounted wealth and income is? There is none. Because we overestimate unaccounted wealth and number of wealthy people. No doubt we are a corrupt society. Despite that this is only the number of wealthy people is.

We think lot of Indians are wealthy. Even if you include unaccounted wealth of all corrupt people, wealthy is not beyond 1% of households. Every rich person thinks and call himself as middle class. In reality, middle class are people who work as drivers, househelp and so on in metros.

You are not understanding. It should get reflected somewhere in consumption. Even when only 4% of households use food delivery apps or 2% of the country only travel overseas or 0.5% of the population only visit 5 star hotels, air travellers are only 4% of the population, 0.1% of households only possess luxury cars- where is the consumption portion of unaccounted income or wealth?

I've been doing these kind of wealth and income calculations for nearly two decades. Once upon a time I used to write blogs. I used to share lot of such data and facts. In India, it is not easy to get reliable data. Things have improved a lot over the years due to many reputed private institutions working on such information. I know I can never be fully accurate. But I'm very confident that I'm approximately correct. Try challenging and disprove the details I share. The more you work on it, you would realise I got the broader picture right.

I'm retired.

@YVCHAKRADHAR 😊

@dmuthuk Sir you will become a Billionaire soon.

I'm not a billionaire. You know what is billion dollars? Around Rs.10,000 crores.

I enjoy researching numbers. Some data is available ready made. Lot of data need tremendous backworking.

We need to get an idea or context of what we are trying to do. Lot of people put enormous efforts on content creation in Youtube and Instagram. But in our country, only around 75,000 content creators make a monthly revenue of Rs.1 lakh or more. Money doesn't come easy. The earners in every sphere is less. It's a brutal world.

In Twitter, everyone keep accusing everyone else as engagement farming. Do you know something? Only around 1000 handles or people in India earn Rs.1 lakh or more per month as share in creator revenue. Just one thousand people in the entire country.

**Yes, the core claim checks out.** Luxury cars (Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Volvo, etc.) remain extremely niche in India. Annual sales recently crossed ~50,000 units for the first time, and cumulative on-road stock is roughly in the 2-4 lakh vehicle range — translating to around 3 lakh households at most (≈0.1% of India's ~300 million households). This lines up with the broader data in the post: overall car ownership is low (6-8% of households), credit cards ~5%, and premium segments even smaller. India's high-net-worth population is growing fast, but it's still a thin top layer. The addressable market for true luxury/premium products is indeed concentrated among the top 1-5%. Data > vibes.

Lot of people reject the income and wealth data I give. That's absolutely fine. But all they tell is the data I provide is wrong. They say India has lots and lots of wealthy people. Please provide some data and facts to justify that. Atleast do some backworking. Feeling alone cannot be a substitute for data. Luxury cars are owned by only around 3 lakhs households, which is 0.1% of the country. Mid to high level segment cars are owned only by 1% of the households. If you include all kinds of cars including hatchbacks, only 6% of Indian households own cars. 5% of population own credit cards. Only 1% of the population owns premium credit cards. Private Banking customers are just 0.1% of total bank customers in India. If you include all kinds of foreign travel, still the percentage doesn't cross 2% of our population. Food delivery apps are predominantly used only by 4% of Indian households. The total number of unique individual air travellers does not exceed 4% of country's population. 5 star hotels in India are being frequented by only 0.5% of population. Only 1.5% of country's population have more than Rs.10 lakhs in demat accounts and mutual fund folios combined. Fine dining where an average bill is more than Rs.4000 is limited to 2% of households. The addressable market for anything premium is 15 million households, top 5% of the country. I can keep on giving you data and facts. Show me where are lots and lots of wealthy people and what they are doing with their money.

No. I was in a client's place coordinating between their office and our offshore team.

My very old followers only know. The day I joined Twitter, I kept Mount Arunachala's image as background in my profile. That remains unchanged till date.

Since Thiruvannamalai (Mount Arunachala) is my god and guru, your terminology is right.

What I'll do with that. I'm not an astrologer.

I go mostly by my intuition. Behavioural psychologists say that is not the right way to go. But I'm comfortable being this way.

I'm a skeptical person by nature. At the same time have an open mind and believe that there are lot of things in universe we don't understand and beyond our comprehension. Recently when an astrologer was appointed in government, people asked me whether I believe in astrology. From my experience, astrology is a craft. It depends on practitioner. No one can predict future accurately. Likewise, it is not easy to get even the past accurate. I'll tell you few things so that you can understand better. We'll move from negative to positive. Late Shakuntala Devi was a prodigy. She was called as human computer. She used to offer astrological consultations. Whenever she came to Chennai, she used to stay in Taj. If my memory serves me right, her consultation fee was Rs.5000 even twenty five years ago. I got her appointment and met her in Taj around 25 years ago. She did not even open the horoscope I took with me. She asked my date, time and place of birth. Within few minutes, without the aid of any computer or calculator, she 100% accurately created my horoscope chart. But the accuracy starts and ends there. Most of the things she said was incorrect. She said I would not survive after few years and insisted I take a talisman from her to avoid death. She asked me to pay Rs.1 lakh for the same. I had no inclination to pay Rs.1 lakh and thought it is better to face death. I'm here even after 25 years. My experiences with astrologers - good, bad and ugly can probably run into dozen or more articles. The best astrologer I've seen till date is Late Balan Nair. He was truly a legend. May be I'll write in detail about him some other time. I've spent many hours with him not only for discussing horoscopes but to delve into issues like destiny, freewill, luck and so on. I've been following @avataram for last few years. He is a very highly qualified person working in a hedge fund. I observed that he often got lot of even difficult things right. He just casually mentions about them. He has never promoted himself despite being good in this craft. I contacted him last year. Surprisingly we found that Late Balan Nair was his astrologer too. I asked Avataram whether he can study horoscopes of me and my son. He spent many hours studying the charts and answered all the questions. He has deep knowledge in astrology. He refused to accept any money from me. This post is way of showing gratitude to him. When I quit employment and was uncertain about what to do in future, among many I met, one was a very prominent astrologer in Tamil Nadu. He said two things. I should only be in employment and would fail if I start something on my own. He said I should not be investing in stock markets and only keep money in safe avenues like FDs. I simply ignored what he said and pursued what I wanted. Here I am.