Are FMPs the Norm of the Day?

Years ago I was sharing my concerns as a mutual fund distributor with a friend as to why clients did not understand mutual fund products? He made an interesting observation. About a hundred years ago Indian families did not trust the banking system and kept all their savings in cash or gold, about 6-7 decades ago our fathers trusted bank FDs, LIC and UTI and then about 20-30 years back they slowly started accepting mutual funds as a means of investment without realising that UTI schemes were mutual funds in their primitive form. There has been a quantum leap in the way our financial markets and acceptance of investment products have evolved over the last 100 years. Unfortunately, I find the knowledge of Fixed Maturity Plans (FMPs) as compared to Fixed Deposits (FDs) is still lacking in the investor fraternity. Here, I have tried to explain the concept and the benefits of FMPs over...