President of India, Franklin Resources Inc
Change the Soch Drive: A Conversation between Avinash Satwalekar & Roshan Abbas
Roshan Abbas, Founder of Kommune, joined Avinash Satwalekar, President of Franklin Templeton India, for an insightful conversation about the purpose, learnings, and impact of Franklin Templeton's "Change The Soch" initiative.
Driven by Avinash, over 30 days, across 21 cities, and spanning 4,000+ kilometres from Kanyakumari to Kashmir, Change the Soch drive travelled across India to better understand women's relationship with money - their saving habits, investing behaviour, financial aspirations, and the barriers they face in taking charge of their financial future.
In this conversation, Avi...
About Avinash Satwalekar
Avinash Satwalekar, President of Franklin Templeton India, has been discussing market volatility, investment products, and India's economic outlook in recent appearances. In an April 2026 conversation about the Sapphire Equity Long-Short SIF, Satwalekar said that the current volatility is "not unusual" and that markets go through phases every three to five years, though they appear to be happening more quickly. He described Specialized Investment Funds (SIFs) as filling a gap between mutual funds and Portfolio Management Services, noting that they allow for derivative use beyond hedging, including "0-25% naked shorts," and require a minimum investment of 10 lakh rupees. Satwalekar stated that investors are increasingly focused on using volatility as an opportunity rather than being victims of it. Speaking at EVOKE 2026 in March, Satwalekar addressed India's global position, saying that while foreign investors have pulled out money, they have also invested significantly, and that much of the outflow is due to private equity funds exiting after taking companies public. He said India's oil dependency has decreased by about 27%, and that oil is expected to stabilize around $90 per barrel on average for the year. In a separate March interview with Moneycontrol, Satwalekar advised investors to "stay calm" during volatile markets, focus on long-term goals, and continue systematic investment plans (SIPs), which he said were designed for such conditions. He also expressed confidence in the financial sector, stating that a strong financial system is core to any economy and that nothing has changed regarding the long-term growth outlook for Indian banks.
Transcript (79 segments)
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Interviewer0:00
India and gold is a relation, actually. It's not that you don't want to invest in gold. You want to think of alternatives as well. When you take a financial decision based on emotion, those are nine out of 10 wrong. Oh my god. They'd never heard of a mutual fund.
A
Avinash Satwalekar0:15
If you get the woman in a community responsible for the finances, automatically the benefits accrue not just to her, but they accrue to the entire community. If you were doing this for fun and pleasure, don't do it.
I
Interviewer0:42
You know, I've normally seen people do boardrooms, conferences.
A
Avinash Satwalekar0:45
Yep.
I
Interviewer0:45
What made you decide on this drive?
A
Avinash Satwalekar0:47
It started with a conversation I had with our women employees on Women's Day in 2023. And just asking them about kind of what do they think about investing, etc. And most of them were like, 'Well, my husband does it. Father does it. Brother does it.' I said, 'Why don't you do it?' They were like, 'Well, I have no interest.' You know, this is in Mumbai, right? The financial capital of the country, in a mutual fund company, and our own employees are saying, 'Well, they're not really.' That's where it started. And now your point about, you know, boardrooms versus the drive, if you want to truly make a change, you have to get women on board. And if you want to make a true change in the country, you have to get rural women on board. Right? Because we've seen enough microfinance studies, right? And they all point to what? If you get the woman in a community responsible for the finances, automatically the benefits accrue not just her, but they accrue to the entire community.
I
Interviewer2:01
No, it's the famous line, right? I mean, you you educate a woman, you educate a village.
A
Avinash Satwalekar2:05
Exactly. If we are having this kind of approach in urban, then the in the rural markets, it's going to be a whole host of different issues. And even more. And that's where you need it, right?
I
Interviewer2:17
Absolutely.
A
Avinash Satwalekar2:17
And I think that So, for us it was more around I mean, at least for me in particular, it was like, okay, where can we have the most impact? And where's the most need? And that's what drove the entire thing.
I
Interviewer2:28
When was the first time you realized that there is this big Bharat versus India? I mean, you know, we don't realize it, but I mean, I travel a lot because of work, and when I'm there, sometimes it really strikes me saying, 'Wow, this such a diverse nation.' So, when did it first hit you saying, 'Wow?'
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Avinash Satwalekar2:47
I think it hits you the minute you hit the first town. For me, it was more around the kind of questions. Right? It was the way they approached certain things. And what was most surprising also was that it's not that they lacked confidence. They lacked conviction. Confidence is what? My confidence is that, okay, I'm fairly comfortable speaking with you, right? So, there's a little bit of that comfort factor that needs to happen. That builds your confidence. Conviction is that when I'm making a decision, it is a targeted, it is a designed, it is not happenstance. It didn't just okay, well, ho gaya. It's not like that. It's actually and it's purposeful. So, that I found was remarkable.
I
Interviewer3:35
You're so right. I mean, this whole thing about conviction.
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Avinash Satwalekar3:39
Yeah.
I
Interviewer3:39
And you know, there are so many people who run these little micro economies. I think in one of the cities where you were, there were people making gajras. Dress?
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Avinash Satwalekar3:47
Yeah. I actually in the south, jasmine is a very
I
Interviewer3:51
Oh, yes.
A
Avinash Satwalekar3:51
It's an amazing flower itself, right? And you can't go to any temple without having it especially in the south, right? So, what we found was that every market had these massive bunches of these jasmine flowers. And as we moved up north, we noticed that the massive bunches became slightly less massive bunches. And you move further up north and it became like okay, let's put a gap in between two flowers. There's a question of abundance in certain parts and then there's a question of pricing. Most of the women don't realize this in the south because they're surrounded by it. So, for them putting like 50 flowers on a 6-inch string is okay, that's normal. You take that 1,000 km north, yeah.
I
Interviewer4:49
And they're like what the hell are you doing? No, no, no, and the flower changes after a while, right? I think you would have seen everything change in that manner.
A
Avinash Satwalekar5:01
Mhm.
I
Interviewer5:01
Right? I mean India and gold is a relationship. Were you able to show them that there were alternate means or methods as well? And what does it take? I mean tell me a story of
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Avinash Satwalekar5:12
So, I think you brought up a real keyword which is alternate means.
I
Interviewer5:17
Absolutely, yeah.
A
Avinash Satwalekar5:18
Because gold is not an investment for us. It's a cultural thing. I mean it's a massive thing. It doesn't matter whether you believe in the value of gold or you say that there is, you're not looking at it as an inflation hedge. Forget all the financial jargon and the rationale around it. It's more a trusted value, right? It's a store of value. It's not something that I intend to use in my lifetime. I intend to pass it on. So, I don't think we ever said that you shouldn't invest in gold. By all means, you should. Right? If that's what you want to do, you should do it. But do it consciously. It's the same thing, right? If I have 100% of my portfolio in gold, I don't think that's the right thing anyway. Just like if you have 100% of your portfolio in equities, that's not the right thing. You want to be diversified across different asset classes.
I
Interviewer6:21
Then you tell them about a mutual fund. Then you say that, 'Hey, this is possibly an alternate means of investment.' And you were saying that, 'Hey, you don't need to put everything into equity, etc.' I mean, you need to have a diversified portfolio. Correct? How did you get the idea of diversification to them?
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Avinash Satwalekar6:36
One thing that was very clear I found was that you have to be able to have a conversation in their language.
I
Interviewer6:45
Oh.
A
Avinash Satwalekar6:45
That not literal language, but making sure that they understand and appreciate from their practical life, right? So, if I come and tell you about asset allocation and all that stuff, it's going to be a waste of time. So, what does a farmer do when you think about it, right? Any farmer is actually doing diversification. They don't even realize it and till I thought about it, I didn't realize it. Now, what do I mean by that? You have seasons for different crops.
I
Interviewer7:17
Ah.
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Avinash Satwalekar7:19
Diversification. Crop rotation. They're doing crop rotation.
I
Interviewer7:21
Oh, how fantastic.
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Avinash Satwalekar7:22
Now, so it was a conversation
I
Interviewer7:24
Must have got that, right?
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Avinash Satwalekar7:25
Completely. So, they said, 'Okay, well.' So, they were like couple of them said, 'Well, we do it for different reasons.' So, I said, 'Of course, diversification is for different reasons. You're doing it why?' Well, this is the best time of the year to grow this. Also, when you grow a different crop, it enriches the soil in a different manner, which makes it ready
I
Interviewer7:46
So true.
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Avinash Satwalekar7:47
For the next crop.
I
Interviewer7:47
So true.
A
Avinash Satwalekar7:48
So, I said, that's exactly what your different asset classes
I
Interviewer7:52
No, I was using
A
Avinash Satwalekar7:54
I will tell you that there was not a single IEP that we left where people were not convinced that they needed to start doing something.
I
Interviewer8:07
So, is it a lack of awareness?
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Avinash Satwalekar8:09
Correct.
I
Interviewer8:09
So, what is
A
Avinash Satwalekar8:10
That tell you? That is exactly right. It's not that I don't want to do it. It's not that I don't understand it. It's just that I don't know about it.
I
Interviewer8:17
What are some other kind of audiences that you tell me some because really we don't even know what you meant.
A
Avinash Satwalekar8:22
Okay, so the whole gamut that we went across was farmers, fisherwomen, we met students, teachers, we met the armed forces, the jawans,
I
Interviewer8:35
Or missus.
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Avinash Satwalekar8:35
We went and met police forces, so we met different kinds of students also. We did a nursing college, we did lawyers.
I
Interviewer8:45
If I was to ask you saying that give me two fundamentals that everybody should sort of just know.
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Avinash Satwalekar8:51
You know, it would be that listen, you need to one is you must do it.
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Interviewer8:55
Correct.
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Avinash Satwalekar8:56
It is an absolute and you'll be surprised at the number of people that don't do it. Right? So, one is you have to do it. There's no ifs, ands, or buts around it. And I think the other misperception people have is that I need a decent amount of money to start investing.
I
Interviewer9:14
You need to get a corpus.
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Avinash Satwalekar9:16
You don't need. You need to get started and build a corpus.
I
Interviewer9:19
You can do something smaller. Like start at smaller 500.
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Avinash Satwalekar9:23
Start at 500.
I
Interviewer9:24
Oh, 500.
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Avinash Satwalekar9:25
500 rupees you can start. So, we actually even have something called a 100 rupee daily SIP, which was created for the vendors because they can't do a monthly SIP. So, they're like, 'Okay, a month is 30 days is very far. I'm living day-to-day. But if I've got an extra 100 bucks, 200 bucks that I've earned today that I can put in, I don't have an avenue to do that.' And then the power of compounding, the famous story about that chess board, right? Which never goes out of my mind. Saying that, the king saying, 'Okay, what do you want?' And he says, 'A grain of rice for everything, but you double it every time.' And he was laughing saying, 'Oh, you want just so little.' But that is the true power of compounding that people don't realize. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think that's human nature.
I
Interviewer10:12
Correct.
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Avinash Satwalekar10:13
We under value the long term.
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Interviewer10:15
Value absolutely.
A
Avinash Satwalekar10:16
And we over value the short term. The biggest challenge with any investments is our behavior. It is our behavior that separates a good investor from a bad investor. And returns-wise, right? And what do I mean by that? So, when you start to panic, when you start to have an emotional reaction to a financial decision, or you take a financial decision based on emotion, those are nine out of 10 wrong. Financial decisions should never be taken with emotions. So, SIP is the perfect tool, right? There is no emotion. Every month
I
Interviewer11:01
It just happens.
A
Avinash Satwalekar11:01
1,000 rupees go out. Consistency. What happens is when you let emotions come in, you then go and what would you do? You stop your SIP.
I
Interviewer11:10
Correct. True.
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Avinash Satwalekar11:11
You reduce it. You do this. You do that. You muck around because it's emotions that are playing havoc.
I
Interviewer11:16
Yeah.
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Avinash Satwalekar11:16
So, my thing to investors or young investors is to say, start early, stay invested, and most important, and this is for all investors actually, is to start with what your goal is. That was one of the things we found in the drive. Right? I was expecting a variety of different goals. Women have different goals and women are actually incredible at being goal-oriented, which is what makes them phenomenal investors.
I
Interviewer11:51
Absolutely.
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Avinash Satwalekar11:52
Right? There's actual scientific evidence and studies that have proven that women investors are better than men.
I
Interviewer11:59
If you ever had to write a book about this drive, what would you call it and what would be a quote on it?
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Avinash Satwalekar12:05
I think change the search is so incredible because it is universal. It is not that we were trying to change women's thinking. We're actually trying to change men's thinking. You want to change that thinking and thinking doesn't change overnight. It is going to take time and it's going to take some time. It takes generations.
I
Interviewer12:30
Well, that's fantastic. Thank you so much. Thanks for driving me around. I've never had a better, and I can't even say co-passenger but you know I'm the co-driver. I'm just your co-passenger but thank you for letting me know about your thought and everything in terms of what happened on this fabulous journey. I wish you many more.
A
Avinash Satwalekar12:50
Thank you very much. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I
Interviewer12:53
Thank you.
A
Avinash Satwalekar12:53
And I hope
I
Interviewer12:54
Time for an espresso.
A
Avinash Satwalekar12:55
Yeah, yes, exactly.
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Narrator12:57
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