[PVS]

Thanks for the thread about the much loved Esteem. Back in the 90s, this was a status symbol! We had purchased a preowned Esteem in 2004, and I had quite a lot of memories in this car. It was peppy, fun to drive and easy on the pocket. On the negatives, the AC was weak, and the power windows were problematic and for a tall chap like me, ingress and egress was a problem.
We sold the Esteem in 2012 and purchased a Wagon R which continues its faithful service till date

[GeeTee TSI]

India's car years! Lovely nostalgia filled images of a time when I started to consume automotive content. The 1000 stood out then, as a car with cool wipers, a modern rear and bright light clusters

Imagine a comparison of the 70s born Contessa, the 80s born 118NE and the 1000, belonging to the early 90s! Outdated models continued to be 'launched' in a starved Indian market by global brands (Astra, 309, Escort)

But credit to Maruti though, at the time of the 1000 launch, it was a contemporary car globally (the then Swift hatch) let us just not talk about it being beaten to death till 2006!

[Captain Slow]

The esteem was a legend! The early cars had most of the their parts imported! I guess only the Esteem/Baleno and Lancer had fully independent rear suspension!

Attaching pictures of our car.

[silverado]

The first time i saw Esteem was when MH-01 type number plates had started.
Those RTO registration types were new around 1991-1992 and i thought esteem was some imported car.

My uncle had a Black type 1 Esteem, this was at times when i had a premier padmini. Just imagine my feelings when i got to know that i would get to keep esteem for a week.It was a very robust car my respect for esteem grew on 26th July 2005, when it safely bought my pregnant cousin sister home on that nightmarish day.( Mumbai was severely flooded and esteem waded through bravely even when water was at window levels )

It was sleek to look and very refined to drive, it was the carb version esteem and it sounded great. I had loads of fun driving it around 5 gardens.

My next encounter with esteem was when bhpain Slick bought one. It was type 2 Mpfi white colour one, my most memorable drive was racing up Lavasa ghat in 2008 , time when Lavasa was still under development.

It was well and truly a drivers car, and a pathbreaking product in our market.
I am a proud collector for couple of esteem scale models from Centy toys.

[Kochikaran]

What surprises me is that this 90s model Esteem had independent rear suspension which even a modern day Honda City does not have.

[civic-dk]

I remember travelling from Baroda to Mount Abu in July 1998 in a new Esteem which belonged to my friend's uncle. We were 4 adults and my 6 month old son in the car. I remember it being a very spacious and powerful car and had fun going up on the twisties to Mount Abu. Off course, it was all in comparison to Maruti 800 .

[Vitalstatistiks]

Originally Posted by Shreyfiesta

[h3][b] So, the Esteem carried a price tag of ₹ 4.7lakh ex-showroom when it was launched.

Footage from Maruti Esteem's launch event in November 1994. Courtesy : WildFilmsIndia

The film clearly mentions that the Esteem costed USD 20,000 when it was launched. At 80 per dollar, that's a cool INR 16 lakhs!! YEP, the same price that a far superior (then and now) Honda City retails for today. And that is without accounting for inflation per se, just dollar conversion.

As much as I feel it myself, we really need a reality check on "prices moving sky high" narrative.

[tejascshetty]

Such a lovely and informative thread! Made for a thoroughly engaging read. A true testament to the Esteem's longevity was that my late grandfather, bought three generations of the Esteem back to back. He would not listen to a word to even consider buying any other car. For him, the Esteem was all the car he would need and more. Even at the ripe old age of 75, he would happily drive around in his Esteem. A lot of great memories in the Esteem for me as well, since it was the car, I learnt to drive as well. Nostalgia indeed!

[fhdowntheline]

One realises we have come a long way indeed in the automotive journey when a car of recent vintage like the Esteem is now consigned to fond reminiscences in automotive discussions. As an aside, the Esteem 1.3 85bhp was my dad's official car at the time of his retirement. In fact we drove from Mumbai (where he retired) to Pune as his final official trip. Still remember the turkish white fabric seat covers which were all the rage at the time, as well as the Kenwood music system. The only thing the driver used to complain about were the somewhat screechy brakes. Once retired, we promptly switched to our very own Santro Zip Plus, which had heralded the start of another era .

[twin-turbo]

Thanks for the trip down the memory lane, It is my childhood car which we owned during my formative years from birth till 10 years old, I fondly remember all the trips we have done on it and all the sentiments associated with it. It had that lovely spoiler, kenwood stereo and the sunscreen and rest is all foggy. It used to go to Delhi every single day, Panchkula every month and every hill station, you name it .I still remember the day it saved my mother’s life 10 years ago when it got into a deadly accident where it was sandwiched between two cars on the NH8. It ran for another 10000 kms till it was sold off at more than 2 lakh kms. It is what started my love of cars.

[vaish9925]

The Esteem surely is an icon in the Indian automotive scene. I currently drive a 1998 Carb Esteem VX, upgraded from a 2012 Tata Nano and can vouch for each and every word in the thread. The engine is a gem and can easily keep up with the modern cars on the expressway.

Pictured here is my car. The car is completely stock except for the HRS alloys and a couple of auxiliary lights upfront. He is my daily as well as my long distance cruiser.

[pannags]

A fitting tribute to the magnificent machine. Excellent work putting this together, @Shreyfiesta.

In 2006, when we were looking to replace our daily workhorse, the iconic Maruti 800, we narrowed it down on the just-launched Swift and went ahead with booking the same. A few days later, the dealership we had booked with lost their rights, because of which we were back to square one as wait times with other dealers had considerably increased. Meanwhile, I decided to give the Esteem, which was at the back of my mind, a fair chance. Post an extensive test drive began the battle between the mind and the heart.

While I had begun to like the looks and styling of the Cooper-like Swift, something about the Esteem constantly lugged my interest. The car was easy to potter around and felt confident when pushed to triple digits. Niceties like the the newly included Kenwood CD/MP3 player, the awesome powered antenna, refreshing beige interiors tilted the balance in it's favour. The rest, as they say, is history.

In the near-decade-long association, clocking close to 90k KM, the Esteem was my companion on umpteen long drives, daily commute to work, and joyful family rides. My ownership experience was remarkable in many aspects, including the driving experience itself, unprecedented reliability, and low cost of ownership. In fact, I don't remember a single instance of running repair during the time the A340 was in my garage.

When I learnt earlier in the day that there is a thread on the Esteem, it stirred up my nostalgia, and I couldn't help but jump in to write. Sharing a couple of visual memories from my archives.

Aug 2008, from a drive to Melkote, 135KM west of Bangalore


Feb 2010, at Angana, The Courtyard, outskirts of Bangalore

[devilwearsprada]

Such a great tribute, here's my first car the Esteem which was the first vehicle I modded too. Great modding potential, and absolute cracker to learn driving on.

[Drpaul]

That's a beautiful, detailed write up.
Brought out a lot of nostalgic memories.

As a kid, I used to carpool in my neighbours' cars to school (both of the neighbours had ambassadors). Then one fine day a shiny blue- green esteem came in. Wasn't it a looker back then or what. Even with 5 of us kids and the driver, don't remember it to be cramped. It was a delight when it was the esteem's turn to do school duty. It was sold of after few years and a black lancer came in.

Next time, I had association with an esteem was when our tenants, who rented the upstairs of our duplex bought one. This was after they stopped selling them in the showrooms and we were flooded with other cars and esteem didn't turn any heads. But this one had after market sporty yellow colour paint job and she was still a looker even after that many years.

PS. Had been asked in previous posts. Why the title? I guess you didn't use it in the usual " lemon car" context but couldn't figure out usage.

[Shreyfiesta]

Originally Posted by Drpaul

Had been asked in previous posts. Why the title? I guess you didn't use it in the usual " lemon car" context but couldn't figure out usage.

To everyone asking me why I've used the term "lemon" in the first post. I usually write car stories on Team-BHP as a hobby whenever I get free time. This thread was actually meant for the Sipani Montana/D1 twins when it was in the assembly line. It came into the assembly line for the first time long ago in April 2022. Due to my exams in June, I was unable to look into the work-in-progress thread and was left untouched in the assembly line for a few months in between. Only thing in my head was the fact that my exams were due in June.

As I was unable to gain enough information about the Sipani Montana-D1 duo from web and old magazines, I just rewrote the whole thread for the Maruti Esteem soon after I came back home in June. When the entire thread was rewritten, I completely forgot about the title and headline of the thread with the intent of finding an apt title later before reporting the completed thread to moderators. I'm pretty sure that I had changed the car name to "Esteem" from Sipani on the first day of this thread on open forum, but again forgot about the rest of the title.

I apologize to all the readers that I could not update the title/headline earlier. The reason why I called the Sipanis as 'lemons' (usually meaning duds) is that they weren't fortunate enough to make it on the road/into production in very large numbers, quite contrary to those that were. Of course, the Esteem cannot be regarded as a lemon, it used to be a robust and reliable workhorse for many. I agree that the usage of the word "lemon" in first post is misleading.

I've requested the mods to change or delete the headline in the first post.