A Meaningful Retirement

At 42, Patiala-based Sonia Goyal is midway into her retirement plans.

- Shipra Singh

At 42, Patiala-based Sonia Goyal is midway into her retirement plans. No, she is not going to retire at 84, she will be retiring in another eight years. “I plan to retire when I turn 50 and have been working towards it over the past seven years,” she says. In distant Gurugram, 26-year-old Abhinav Dhar has plans to take voluntary retirement between the age of 35 and 45. “The actual time of retirement will be a function of my financial health, satisfaction with a job and the opportunities that I’ve scoped out to keep myself engaged once I stop working fulltime,” he says.

Two contrastingly different people from different places, but the desire to retire early has caught the fancy of several Indians. Some plan to do nothing active once they call it a day, even while some are cautious enough to state that they would continue to work in some fashion, but the chase to earn a living won’t be the case. “People underestimate retirement expenses. Even for people with a modest lifestyle, ₹40-50 lakh is not a sufficient amount,” warns Suresh Sadagopan, CFP, Ladder7 Financial Advisories.