This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Princess Jahnavi Kumari Mewar, a member of India’s Mewar royal family who runs her family’s multi-family office and the private equity firm she founded, Auctus Fora. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
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I had this most tremendous privilege of birth. The last official, government-recognized king in India was my grandfather’s elder brother, and then after that, the monarchy didn’t really exist. It turned into a democracy.
I grew up as most kids would. The difference was that I ended up going to school within the palace with my cousins.
When we had VIPs come down for formal visits to the palace, part of the evening was about us holding our own. We’d learn about their culture, show them around our family properties, and have conversations beyond, “Hi, do you want to see my toy?” That foundation taught us how to be comfortable in any situation with anybody.
My parents had zero expectations that I would follow in the family business — my family was invested in various areas, including real estate, hospitality, consumer products, logistics, and education — but I was always very motivated to see what my father did and how much he loved it.
As a kid, I would run to his office and insist on sitting on his chair and signing things; they would just throw random files in front of me, which, I’m guessing, were headed to the shredder.
As I got older, I became more involved in the business, was allowed to observe, and occasionally found myself useful. That meant sitting through meetings I did not fully understand at the time, reviewing documents, asking inconvenient questions, and being corrected often enough to develop a certain respect for precision.
Still, money was never unlimited or guaranteed. When I went to university, I got a car, my rent was paid for, and I got pocket money, but it was never unlimited. I worked three jobs while still doing my assignments and going to classes. I worked for a catering company, as a club promoter, and as a telemarketer. It was a nightmare — that’s when the privilege comes in.
A formal family office
At 18, I had been observing my father for years, and the expectation shifted to contribution. If something was assigned, it was expected to be delivered, and delivered well.
Less than four months before the global financial crisis, I got this weird gut feeling. I was at university in Melbourne studying business and international trade, and I called my father and said, “Whatever I’m seeing and reading, nothing is making sense. There’s a lot of abstract information floating around, and it sounds like it’s not going to be very good for real estate or hospitality.”
It wasn’t really coming from some miraculous wisdom. I just didn’t know what to make of it, and I was scared of the future and what it might mean. It was bum-up, head-down, focused for a few months. We managed to exit several hospitality investments with a positive return before the global financial crisis.
In my early 20s, I really took over and started restructuring our investment company into a formalized family office.
My father and his friends and family, whose money the office managed, were about solidarity and unity in their investments more than value, and they didn’t want to bring in outside financing.
The first step was to start getting paid. My father had co-invested heavily with longtime friends and family, but the brunt of the portfolio management costs was borne by us.
I remember asking my father if we could send out an email or a letter asking them to cover their own costs, and he poo-pooed the idea. So, without my father’s consent, I made an announcement at a family party: you’re going to have to pay your way to co-invest with us.
Other changes had to be made.
We became globally opportunistic, so I recalibrated our portfolio, allocating more to emerging markets and less to developing ones. Previously, emerging geographic markets were treated as side bets, but now they are structural priorities, provided there is clarity on governance, local alignment, and exit pathways.
We also became far more direct. Intermediation is expensive, not just in fees but in diluted accountability. We got rid of accountants, investment bankers, and pseudo-advisors.
When you walk into a room full of, let’s say, portfolio asset stakeholders, you’re going to get the same looks and the same questions: “Do you really know what you’re doing or what you’re talking about? ” It certainly wasn’t easy, but I decided I’m just going to make myself really, really unapologetic about being in the room, but also really, really listening and learning.
It’s a very precarious balance. I also learned a lot from what I call the “dinosaur squad.” They’re protective toward my parents. They want to protect the portfolio assets. They are very risk-averse. They made me understand the absolute need for preservation before shooting the lights out.
