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Had you invested Rs 25,000 in Oudh Sugar on January 1, 2004, you would have been sitting pretty on a goody-bag worth Rs 1,28,769 on Christmas Eve...

If the bulls on Dalal Street don't impress you or your investment decisions, and you'd still like to stay away from equity, that's a choice you as an investor is entitled to. But consider this — if you had put in Rs 25,000 in Oudh Sugar on January 1, 2004, you would have been sitting on a neat pile on Christmas Eve this year... a whopping Rs 1,28,769.

Your money in Upper Ganges would have performed only a tad shorter giving you Rs 1,22,129, while Hyderabad Industries would have given you a little nest egg of Rs 1,19,843. Another sugar stock that would have made you a lakhpati is KCP Sugar, where your Rs 25,000 would have become Rs 1,05,848.

One would understand better the refrain of "smart investor" mouthed constantly by equity experts from noting that while corporate biggies like the power equipment manufacturers ABB and BHEL would have converted your Rs 25,000 into only Rs 36,761 and Rs 35,300 respectively, Mangalam Cement or Radio Khaitan would have made your kitty swell to Rs 85,545 and Rs 83,651. But if you had opted for ACC instead of Mangalam Cement, you would have got only Rs 31,151.

The new darlings of the equity market like Pantaloon Retail (Rs 72,199), Glenmark Pharma (Rs 69,500), Praj Industries (Rs 69,143), Panacea Biotec (Rs 68,550), Chennai Petro (Rs 62,882), Allahabad Bank (Rs 62,385) and Sintex Industries (Rs 62,347), would have given you impressive returns too.

While an Allahabad Bank would have made your Rs 25,000 grow to Rs 62,385, during the same period premium private sector banks like HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank would have grown it only to Rs 34,260 and Rs 30,661.

Coming to the pharma sector while Aventis Pharma would have turned your Rs 25,000 into Rs 46,622, a pharma giant like Ranbaxy Laboratories would have given a marginal profit of Rs 3,034, which is still a respectable 12 per cent. But another pharma major — Dr Reddys Laboratories would have actually diminished your capital to Rs 14,822.

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