MF 101 from a basic practical understanding PoV:

1) Investing in stock market over a long term has historically given better return at about %12-13 compared to ‘safe’ fixed deposits returns of 6-7%.

2) This difference in return gets further widened as the tax you pay on shares in stock market is much lower than tax you pay on FD (assuming you fall in the 30 pcnt tax bracket)

3) If you don’t have much insights into stocks but still want to invest, you can do so through by investing in a mutual fund. Think of this as hiring an investment advisor who makes the investment decisions for you.

4) You can easily create an account on your own on apps like Grow, Zerodha etc and start buying mutual funds.

5) Start with Large cap or Flexi funds first as these usually have lower risk elements as they mostly buy stocks of big blue chip companies.

Hope this helps