Tata 1-lakh car ready, but does India really need it ???

[Mpower]

The discussion has veered waay off topic. (thanks to Manish). So I am renaming this thread with a more appropriate title.

In my view, the company will give the customer what he wants. You guys are selfishly thinking of your situation in big cities where you live, but what about small towns where traffic is no problem and incomes are much lower. You expect a 70 yr old man with a budget of 1 lakh to drive a scooter when he can happily and safely cruise in TATA's car.

[msdivy]

Population density:
Japan: 339
India: 336
France: 313

Car density (Y2000):
Japan 413.3
India 5.9
France 476.5
Even if we assume car density has doubled in last 6 years, its still 12 cars per 1000 people.
Again if we assume other vehicles (like Truck, Bus, Bike/Scooter, etc) are relative to population, then India car density is very low.

If Japan can handle a car density of 413.3, why not India?

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by sajo

What if Mercedes drivers start wishing the same about everything priced lower than their machines? A nation getting motorised is not necessarily be a bad thing.

I agree. What if they say "Take all these NHCs, Balenos, etc of the roads." ? We should learn to co-exist.

One silver lining I see is the fact that most of the bike buyers/users are going to be potential customers for this 1-lac car. Which means that many lesser bikes on the road. Which sounds great to me because badly driven bikes are the worst menace here (along with autorickshaws) - zipping in between 2 cars when there is not enough space, speeding even when the brakes are not adequate to stop fast enough etc etc. I can handle a 1-lakh car driver much easier than a rowdy biker.

[rahul_intlad]

OT[dont want to start a new thread]:

Emphasising that the Tatas have “more than enough evidence” of involvement of a competitor behind the protests against the company's prestigious Rs one lakh car project at Singur, Tata group chief Ratan Tata today said he would name the company “at an appropriate time.” “We have more than enough evidence of the involvement of a competitor (behind the trouble). I am not known to make frivolous comments,” Tata told FE, when asked to reveal the name of the company that was behind the trouble at Singur, where the company is constructing a greenfield plant for its ambitious small car.Tata emphasised, “We will name it at an appropriate time or if I am aggravated enough. It is still not near my patience levels.”
.......................


Maruti Udyog, had dared the Tatas to name the competitor he felt had tried to derail the project. “I don't know which competitor he is talking about. Since he has the knowledge, he should tell it," Khattar had said. The Maruti MD had even added: "We don't do all these things (scuttling a rival's project). We believe in healthy competition.”



Source:
Tata stops short of naming rival behind Singur botch

[tushky]

is this the real photo of 1 lakh car???

sourse- [COLOR=#0000ff]http://www.autobild.de/heftarc...3D%3D[/COLOR]

[carCrazy25]

Originally Posted by man23ish

Just close your eyes for a moment and imagine every tom-dick-harry on the road having a car, meaning less people on the foot-path and more people on the road. one car: one person, the chaos it will create espe....

One of the reasons (which is often overlooked) for smooth traffic in the west apart from the Good inf rastructure is the montonous traffic, all are driving 4 wheelers.
Unlike back home where u got 2 wheelers, 3 wheelers, 4 wheelers u name the combination.
I gladly welcome this decision by Tata.
After all this is a suggestion come from one of the best minds in India
APJ Abdul Kalam.

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by man23ish

i have shelved my car around 2 years back and i ride a honda eterno motoscooter right now. Relocated close to my office so that i can walk to work at times. And i am doing my bit for the environment.

@manish, while I do not agree with your other views about more cars on the road, I appreciate what you are doing above.

We need more people like this who think of the environment. While I also thought on the lines of n_aditya (using car only during weekends) and you (moving to bike), it is not possible due to the 40km daily commute involved which can cause serious backache on a bike - I have a back problem. So instead I have been car-pooling for the last 3-4 years and that way, ensure that atleast there is one lesser car on the road.

Originally Posted by rahul_intlad

Maruti Udyog, had dared the Tatas to name the competitor he felt had tried to derail the project. “I don't know which competitor he is talking about. Since he has the knowledge, he should tell it," Khattar had said. The Maruti MD had even added: "We don't do all these things (scuttling a rival's project). We believe in healthy competition.

I wonder why MUL is responding if they are not involved and when Tata has not directly named them. Maybe because logically only MUL can compete with Tatas on this small car platform.

[vezj420]

Good points all in this thread...not much from me to add, but.....

@tushky: this car was discussed in another thread, but highly unlikely that THIS is the prototype of Tata's 1-lakh car.

While I agree with 'traffic uniformity', mentioned above, I just hope the people who do purchase and migrate to this car aren't horrible drivers when they use it...I mean, the car is expectedly pretty small, so u can just imagine "Bunty" (from the posts above) cutting and zig-zagging through traffic in a much more dangerous manner than a motorcyclist would. I'd rather clip a bike than a 4-wheeler any day! (although there are exceptions to this)

If I'm wrong about the prototype pic above, and the car is indeed a 2-seater (like the Reva), I don't think u'll have too many buyers for it. Pretty sure it will be at least a 4-seater though.

I wholeheartedly support the notion of tier-II cities and villages being motorized through the Tata project. What the car will do to the cities remains to be seen...who knows, this could be the shot in the arm for some local govts to improve roads and parking spaces! (or just add to their 'to do' piles)

Finally, the 1-lakh car cannot be sold for Rs. 1,00,000 flat. I don't remember which newspaper's article I read, but some economist had argued that given conditions in the Indian vehicle market, the car will cost at least 1.2 - 1.3 lakhs, ex-showroom when it does come out, due to various reasons. Let's not forget the added costs of registration, insurance, and dealer cuts. My guess is that the car will, in reality, cost damn near 2-lakhs coming out of the dealer's - the price of an 800 back in the day.

[rr_zen]

A lot of good points out there from all of us. However, I feel that more that blaming Tata for launching the 1 lakh car, why not revolt against the government (now that this is an opportune moment !) to bring in a paradigm shift to the shoddy infrastructure that we have. Why cant we have better roads (read that as wider) and strict enforcement of rules. I always used to wonder what the government really does with all the money coming in as road taxes not to mention the astronomical number of vehicles registered with the RTOs everyday.

[man23ish]

Originally Posted by msdivy

Population density:
Japan: 339
India: 336
France: 313

Car density (Y2000):
Japan 413.3
India 5.9
France 476.5
Even if we assume car density has doubled in last 6 years, its still 12 cars per 1000 people.
Again if we assume other vehicles (like Truck, Bus, Bike/Scooter, etc) are relative to population, then India car density is very low.

If Japan can handle a car density of 413.3, why not India?

You want statistics, i'll give you statistics.. Read the following article from wikipedia..

Energy consumption broadly tracks with gross national product, although there is a significant difference between the consumption levels of the United States with 11.4 kW per person and Japan and Germany with 6 kW per person. Canada has the highest energy consumption per person, whereas the lowest energy consumption takes place in the third world. In developing countries such as India the per person energy use is closer to 0.5 kW.

The most significant growth of energy consumption is currently taking place in China, which has been growing at 5.5% per year over the last 25 years. Its population of 1.3 billion people is currently consuming energy at a rate of 2 kW per person.

One metric of efficiency is energy intensity. This is a measure of the amount of energy it takes a country to produce a dollar of gross domestic product. Japan and the UK are among the most efficient in the world, while developing countries lack the resources to buy energy.

Source: World energy resources and consumption - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Folks, don't get me wrong here and i am not against TATA launching a Rs 1 Lakh car. But i am against the aftermath of such an unthoughtful and short-sighted action.. It is a fact that the development index of any country depends on its energy security for atleast a decade or so and to be honest, our country's figures are not at all impressive. We consume only 10% of the global average and 25% of what China consumes per capita. But still we are energy starved.. (Check out places in interior Maharashtra, Andhra, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, etc where there are power-cuts up to 8 hours in a day)

Now, Imagine 25% of a billion people splurging fuel in a 1 Lakh car, not only will this result in the fuel-prices reaching sky-high.. But will also result in fuel-shortages.. What we need is rapid investment in alternate sources of energy..

I am sorry for taking this thing so much off-topic.. But i feel that this is the right forum of educated, knowledgable people who can understand, foresee and envisage the things to come in the future.. I am just putting the facts as i see it.. And i really feel strongly about it..

[netarchie]

Anyways why should Tata's think about the aftermath of launching 1 Lakh car, it is for the government to think about that.
A automobile company can only manufacture cars and not the roads/infrastucture , on which their cars will run.

[Steeroid]

Originally Posted by man23ish

Now, Imagine 25% of a billion people splurging fuel in a 1 Lakh car, not only will this result in the fuel-prices reaching sky-high.. But will also result in fuel-shortages.. What we need is rapid investment in alternate sources of energy..

Your point of energy requirements is valid, but going by that arguement why does India need about 100+ television channels of its own - imagine how much energy we can conserve by not watching television and those stupid 'Kyunki' serials. Not to mention live telecasts of cricket matches that we seem to lose anyway. Why do we need shopping malls where they need to create so much of airconditioned infrastructure for people to visit? That point could be stretched forever

Check out places in interior Maharashtra, Andhra, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, etc where there are power-cuts up to 8 hours in a day.

While electricity might be their basic need right now, dont you think they have aspirations to drive around, watch television and generally do all the decadent stuff that the rest of us do?

And if one is talking about the amount of money being spent to produce the 1 lakh car, let us rewind a bit to the days when Tata developed the Indica platform at a cost that was a ridiculous fraction (less than 30%) of what other automobile majors spend to develop a new platform.

How much money do you think they would spend on developing this new vehicle? Its not like they're inventing something from scratch - they are inventing a way of making something using less resources.

It is wrong to blame a manufacturer for trying to meet a demand a particular need or requirement, because that is what business is all about.

Yes it is important that we develop alternate sources of energy, but for that I would blame the Energy Producers in India, especially the fat-cat petroleum majors who make money out of buying oil from abroad and adding fat margins to sell it here. If only they saw themselves as ENERGY service providers and not fuel vendors.

[Steeroid]

Originally Posted by bigman

This should be scrapped unless Tata wants to throw in free driving lessons with every purchase. All that the 1lakh car is going to do is increase the number of bad drivers on our roads.

If people with similar feelings had their way in the early 80s when Maruti was planning to launch, we'd still be driving to work in Ambassadors, Fiats and Heralds. Thank god for Sanjay Gandhi - the REAL father of motoring in India.

If driving has become progressively more difficult over the last ten years it is not Maruti's fault but the fault of a shortsighted government which still expects the country to churn out double digit growth figures on an infrastructure that was put in place in the early 5-year plans of Jawaharlal Nehru. It is a pity that it took the first full-term non-congress government to relook at the infrastructure that he put in place.

How come nobody blames Bill Gates for the slow bandwidth we have to live with thanks to the proliferation of personal computers? If we didnt have Windows we'd probably have computers relegated to the IT departments, no torrent streams and no congestion on the internet.

[namit]

Fully agree with Netarchie and Steeroid ........

TATA's business is to produce cars and infact we should appreciate the efforts of TATA to think otherwise and trying to make 4 wheelers within the reach of most.

Government is to be blamed for lack of infrastructure and planning.

[namit]

Any idea how this 1 lakh car looks like ... any spy pictures ??