A princess who runs a family office and a private equity firm explains how she preserves wealth, invests globally, and manages risk.
Royal wealth doesn’t survive on pedigree alone. For Princess Jahnavi Kumari Mewar, it has to be managed like a living business: with discipline, sharp governance, and constant decisions about where capital should—and should not—go.
In an as-told-to conversation. the member of India’s Mewar royal family described a life shaped by the transition from monarchy to democracy.. Her grandfather’s elder brother was the last official. government-recognized king in India. and after that. the monarchy effectively faded into a democratic system.. Even so. her upbringing preserved a distinctly “hands-on” education: she studied within the palace alongside her cousins and learned to handle visitors and formal engagements with confidence.
That early training, she said, wasn’t only ceremonial.. When VIPs came for formal visits. her family involved them in conversations and activities that went beyond surface interactions. including tours of family properties and discussions of culture.. The experience taught her. in practice. how to be comfortable in different rooms with different people—an ability she later carried into financial meetings and investment decision-making.
Her family was invested across multiple areas, including real estate, hospitality, consumer products, logistics, and education.. Yet her parents placed no expectation that she would join the family business.. What changed. she said. was her own motivation to understand what her father did and why he loved it—especially the day-to-day work of managing assets and making decisions under uncertainty.
As a child. she said she would rush to her father’s office insisting on sitting in his chair and handling paperwork. even if the “files” placed before her were. by her own guess. destined for the shredder.. Over time. her role evolved into observation and occasional help—long meetings. reviewing documents. asking “inconvenient questions. ” and being corrected often enough that she developed a respect for precision in financial work.
Money, however, was never treated as unlimited or guaranteed.. When she moved to university. she described a setup that included a car. rent covered. and pocket money—but with clear limits.. To handle living and study costs. she worked three jobs at once while continuing her assignments and attending classes. including roles in catering. club promotion. and telemarketing.
That stretch, she said, was difficult enough to make privilege feel tangible in hindsight. It also became the grounding for how she approached investing later: she understood the real-world pressure of cash flow, time, and trade-offs, rather than treating investments as abstract theory.
By 18, she moved from observing to contributing as expectations shifted.. If she was assigned something, she said it had to be delivered and delivered well.. Less than four months before the global financial crisis. she described a gut feeling that the information she was encountering—while studying business and international trade in Melbourne—did not “make sense” and suggested worse prospects for real estate and hospitality.
Her warning was not framed as mystical insight.. Instead. she said she was scared about what the future might bring. leading to a focused period of “bum-up. head-down” work.. The timing mattered: her family office managed to exit several hospitality investments with positive returns before the global financial crisis took hold. a result she pointed to as evidence that preparation and timing can reduce exposure when conditions worsen.
In her early 20s, she took over more decisively and began restructuring the investment company into a formalized family office.. The approach reflected her family’s culture: her father and his circle valued solidarity and unity in investments more than sheer valuation metrics. and they preferred to avoid bringing in outside financing.
The first step in that formalization. she said. was to ensure the office could get paid—especially because her father had co-invested heavily with longstanding friends and family. while the costs of managing the portfolio were largely borne by the group running the office.. When she suggested asking co-investors to cover their share of costs. she said her father initially rejected the idea. but she moved forward differently.
Without her father’s consent. she described making an announcement at a family gathering that co-investors would need to pay their own way if they wanted to continue co-investing.. It was a moment that turned internal dynamics into more formal expectations—an effort that. in her telling. helped make the office sustainable and clearer about responsibilities.
She also shifted how the portfolio was built and governed.. Her family office became globally opportunistic, she said, reallocating toward emerging markets and away from developing ones.. Previously. emerging geographic markets had been treated as side bets. but now she described them as structural priorities—conditional on clarity on governance. alignment with local realities. and a defined path to exits.
The move away from “side bets” was linked to the way she characterized her operating philosophy: investing is not only about where returns might appear, but about whether control, accountability, and realistic liquidity exist. In that framing, risk is managed through structure, not through optimism.
Alongside portfolio recalibration, she said the office became far more direct in its execution.. Intermediation, she argued, is expensive not only in fees but also because it can dilute accountability.. As a result, she described getting rid of accountants, investment bankers, and what she called pseudo-advisors.
Those changes came with practical pushback.. She described walking into rooms of asset stakeholders and being met with skepticism—questions about whether she truly knew what she was doing or what she was talking about.. Rather than retreat. she said she chose to be unapologetically present in those discussions while also listening and learning. treating resistance as part of the cost of driving change.
Her learning also came from people she described as the “dinosaur squad. ” an internal group protective of her parents and notably risk-averse.. She said they helped her understand a principle she treats as essential: preservation before “shooting the lights out.” In other words. the portfolio’s survival has to be prioritized before aggressive bets.
That preservation mindset connects back to her early experience in business and international trade. where uncertainty felt abstract—until she confronted how shocks can hit particular sectors such as real estate and hospitality.. It also reflects the family office’s cultural emphasis on unity. which. in her account. required formal mechanisms to handle money responsibly without fracturing relationships.
Taken together. her story reads like a practical wealth-management approach rather than a ceremonial one: limit spending. formalize governance. clarify who pays for costs. avoid expensive intermediaries. and commit to investment structures that specify accountability and exits—especially when markets become unstable.. For investors watching family capital play out across generations. the central message is that “keeping royal money alive” often comes down to risk control. not reputation.
family office private equity emerging markets wealth management global investing real estate hospitality investments