I will never do business with friends and family

Just back from a two day CEO retreat, Tara Singh Vachani is gearing up for the launch of her solo project-Antara Senior Living. Expected to be ready by 2016, Antara is a first-of-its-kind in India: a world-class senior living community in Dehradun. Spread over 20 acres, the site will have more than 260 apartments, each costing between Rs 1.25 crore and Rs 7 crore, the smallest with an area of 1,500 sq. ft. In an extended conversation that took place at her firm's marketing studio in Defence Colony and later at her Panscheel Enclave apartment, the unfailingly polite Vachani spoke at length about her ambitious dream project, the responsibilities of inheritance and what she has learned from "the king of relationships," her father Max India chairman Analjit Singh. Excerpts:

Antara Is An Aspirational Choicе

In India old age homes have always been considered a last resort of the desperate. In most communities they are set up to provide shelter and basic needs to people who have no other way of surviving. In contrast, Antara is a choice you are making towards a better quality of life. It's aspirational. In the US people work hard to arrive at a stage where they can afford to live in one of the top ten senior living communities in the country. Its waiting lists are more competitive than Harvard Business School and far more expensive. And ironically your quality of life there is better than what you have had during all your younger years. After you reach the age of perhaps 60 and you have finished spending money on your children, on houses or cars or art you will reach a stage where you say I am now going to spend some money on myself, in my well being and in improving my quality of life. Antara is not in any way an old age home or a retirement centre but is instead a choice for people to decide how they want to spend their golden years. In my best practice visits to about 40 senior living communities around the world I always leave feeling so inspired. (I think) I can't wait for when I reach certain stage in my life, when I've contributed to the world as a professional and my family is settled so I can then focus my energies on myself and do the stuff I have always wanted

We Are Culturally Ready For This

In our first few months of conceptualising and research we wondered whether India was ready, as a culture, for something like Antara. Of course some might consider it unusual for both parents (to want to) and children (for encouraging or supporting their parents) to go and live in a senior living community. But India is not a country, it is a continent, it is the most diverse, complex place in the universe.Which is why I don't think one particular culture dictates us at all. According to our research the majority of Indians, North Indians in particular, prefer to live with their family in larger groups. But there are plenty of progressive people who live without their children, who are very independent in every sense of the word and would like to continue to remain so. At Antara they don't have to manage domestic help or worrying about crime. We are targeting perhaps a thousand couples in the country as prospective residents within the next 5 to 10 years.