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7th February 2010, 22:31
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8th May 2014, 14:30
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| Nostalgia - Maruti: Three decades of the dictator! Looking at Parry's latest report on Indian Car Sales, something struck me, and struck me hard... Somewhere in the parallel universe Audition for 2014 Disney's new Pixar film 'Cars 3' has its studio flouted with new generation over-enthusiastic, forerunners showing off their bling like the DSGs, (twin) turbo charged fuel injection engines, automatic assists in parking, driving and what nots and at the back of the crowd there is a follower with an aged, matured, refined and experienced look trying to push-through gently to get to the front with a very convincing and confident poise. The follower here definitely as you might have guessed is Maruti and I sincerely hope that one day it makes it through the audition. A well deserved king!  What made me draft this post? Well, its the 'Omni'. Though Omni has been appearing in the previous car sales report but this time it caught my attention because if you look closely at the report, all other cars that make an appearance in top 20 are recent models aging not more than 3 year on tops. Our lean Omni is sandwiched between hatchbacks (on the left) and SUVs (on the right) but still standing tall. What more to say? Omni made me nostalgic and yes, a kid nostalgia transported me to the past. The past is early 80's wherein we owned an Ambassador and Padmini and commuted a lot on the Delhi-Jaipur highway (NH8). As kids the road journeys used to be the biggest ordeal in the entire part of the vacation/holiday/weekend getaway. And this commute in an Amby or a Padmini certainly did not help us as kids. The noisy engines, harsh NVH levels, bumpy rides on those single sofa springy seats, boring dash, a giant steering wheel with chrome plated concentric horn ring, column mounted gear shifters...and yaaawwnnn! Yes we would more often than not, doze off!  And then someone in my family bought a green colored Maruti 800! The Indian automotive scene had started to change, and change with a bang. If I were to describe my experience of sitting in the 800 for the first time it would be something similar to that of making an inquisitive 5 year old boy sit in an airplane cockpit. The first 5 minutes were of complete silence observing all around. Sleek steering wheel with mounted horn buttons, turn indicator stalks, recliner bucket seats in the front with a meaty joystick gear lever mounted in-between the seats, knobs to switch air flow between modes, seat belts, cassette rack and whoa!!...a slide in-out ashtray! Start the engine and you as a kid were not convinced if its turned on, being used to the spine jarring shudder of an Amby and Padmini. Now only if this 800 could fly!  That was the start and year after year this car manufacturer rolled out models that were an epitome of innovation and design (in most cases) by the standards of what we were seeing around then on the roads. People were so very fascinated by the Omni when it released. 'Maruti Van' as they called it, attracted people for its sliding doors and windows, perpetual seating capacity and an almost horizontal steering wheel. I was very impressed by the positioning of the steering wheel in particular because it was similar to the layout of trucks/buses and as I as a kid was hell bent on getting an opportunity to drive a truck, that never happened. Closing the sliding door of the 'Maruti Van' was one of the most exciting things to do which as kids, never happened in the first go because there was some amount of strength required to slide it to a lock. Though the highway dynamics and safety were a big concern with the van, it still was a big hit in the city.  Then came the biggest drool of the decade - the Maruti Gypsy, with the soft top. It was the then 'SUV' on Indian roads. The only other SUV that has as excited me as the Gypsy is the Safari. The long flat trunk, back mounted spare wheel, big tires and a solid built made the Gypsy look like the undisputed king of the road. The might of Amby had a competitor now, and a good looking one too! There was an ad on TV then, by the tire Manufacturer 'Ceat' that had Naseer Abdullah driving around a Gypsy in a forest swamp - with mouth half open, I used to think to myself that this is the car...this it is! I still remember how much did I try to convince my dad to buy a Gypsy over a Swift when he was changing his Santro. His unarguable retort to my 'convincing' technicalities was - 'How would it look, me driving a god damn gypsy to work?!!'. In my mind I thought - 'How very cool dad, how very cool...!' Such was the aura of the Gypsy.  Just about the same time, Maruti 1000 started doing rounds on the Indian road, which revamped the chauffeur driven 'Saheb' culture in India. A sporty looking premium sedan it was during that time, which got later re-branded into Maruti Esteem with one of the finest engines of its time and times to come. Maruti 1000 was an astonishing pleasant surprise, welcomed with a huge applause from the people who were on the verge of scraping their HM Contessa's which was primarily the then 'Saheb' culture sedan.  During mid 90's 800s bigger brother Maruti Zen was released that introduced the first premium hatchback concept in India. The design of the car was truly Japanese inspired with smooth curves all around. It was a head turner for sure and especially a hit with people who wanted to move up one class from the 800.  These five model from the Maruti's assembly line ruled India with no competition whatsoever for almost two decades till the Koreans entered the Indian market and launched their Santro, the Tata's their Indica and Daewoo their Matiz. After a decade of fight and competition on Indian roads between all these car manufacturers, Maruti still holds the kings throne in terms of Sales and Service. They might not be coming up with a head turner and a drooler anymore but yes, they understand the pulse of the Indian automobile market like no other manufacturer does. This is excellent for the consumer who in turn gets thousands of choices to choose from, from different manufactures who try to squeeze in more and more in the same chassis, frame and engine within the same cost or maybe less, just so that they get a big slice of the cake! Long live the King! Cheers! Last edited by raveesh_k : 8th May 2014 at 18:31. |
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11th June 2014, 15:20
| #99 |
| BHPian Join Date: Feb 2012 Location: Mumbai
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9th May 2016, 21:02
| #100 |
| Senior - BHPian  | Re: Revisiting the Indian automobile Industry: Past, Present and future I don't' know how I found this thread; just casual browsing and found this wonderful thread. Sid, you deserve standing ovation for penning it down. What a wonderful journey of Indian automotive industry at a glance with so many old memories refreshing up while reading it. 5 years old thread, still deserves 5 stars.  EDiT - Inspired by your thread, I would like to cover up the 2010-2016 phase of Indian automotive industry very soon in this thread only. Last edited by bluevolt : 9th May 2016 at 21:04. |
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