Man, who retired at 45 with Rs 1 crore, explains how he runs household on just Rs 50,000 a month now

A post on a former HR professional - Amit Chilka, who retired at 45, with Rs 1 crore no less is going viral on X. Taking to the microblogging platform, a user named Soniya Deshwal shared Chilka’s story. After his retirement, Chilka left Pune and shifted to Dehradun, where he works as a freelancer. In his LinkedIn post, he revealed that his monthly expenses in Dehradun was 30% of what it was in Pune.

In an interview with the Hindustan Times, Chilka revealed his expenses in Dehradun came down from Rs 1.5 lakh to just Rs 50,000! The expenses are covered by his consulting fees and income from a retreat he opened.

He reveled he and his wife are staying at her uncle’s old house rent-free. This saves a huge chunk of expenses. “We paid for the renovation and contribute a very small amount toward upkeep. Effectively, we are rent-free,” he admitted.

Moving to Dehradun also blessed the family with a significant reduction of their daughter’s education fees.

“Third, my daughter's school fees came down from approximately ₹32,000 a month in Pune to ₹7,000 a month here. The extra classes dropped from ₹12,000–15,000 to around ₹4,000. Together that is a saving of over ₹30,000 a month on education alone—without any compromise on the quality of schooling she is receiving,” said Chilka.

The Chilkas also reduced eating out and that saved them another Rs 20,000. The eating out that filled the social calendar in Pune. The weekend commitments. The subscriptions and services that had accumulated because I was too busy to examine them,” said Chilka.

Chilka is a retired HR professional. He runs a retreat that provides 4-day vacation for burned out corporate professionals, startup founders.

In his viral LinkedIn post, Chilka stated that you do not need Rs 10 crore in your bank account to retire early. “₹1 crore — across mutual funds, PPF, NPS, and a child education fund — plus one flat in Pune, owned outright, producing rental income. That was the whole structure. That was enough.”