A mutual fund is a group of investors operating through a fund manager to purchase a diverse portfolio of stocks or bonds. Mutual funds are highly cost efficient and very easy to invest in. By pooling money together in a mutual fund, investors can purchase stocks or bonds with much lower trading costs than if they tried to do it on their own. Also, one doesn't have to figure out which stocks or bonds to buy. But the biggest advantage of mutual funds is diversification.One of the options is to invest the money in stock market. But a common investor is not informed and competent enough to understand the intricacies of stock market. This is where mutual funds come to the rescue.Nowadays, bank rates have fallen down and are generally below the inflation rate. Therefore,keeping large amounts of money in bank is not a wise option, as in real terms the value of money decreases over a period of time.Each unit of these schemes reflects the share of investor in the respective fund and its appreciation is judged by the Net Asset Value (NAV) of the scheme. The NAV is directly linked to the bullish and bearish trends of the markets as the pooled money is invested either inequity shares or in debentures or treasury bills. Indian Mutual Funds unveils this multi-dimensional avenue, with its intricacies, in a fashionable manner as mutual funds up-hold ample scope of generating decent returns by some thoughtful investment.