The Hindu Business Line : World's cheapest car is here

People’s car
Market launch by second quarter
623 cc rear-mounted engine
4-speed manual gear-box
20 km per litre
Lower emission than average motorcycle

Small and beautiful: Mr Ratan Tata, Tata Group Chairman, unveiling the Rs 1 lakh car `Nano' at the 9th Auto Expo in the Capital on Thursday. - Ramesh Sharma

Our Bureau

New Delhi, Jan 10 The much-awaited Tatas’ Rs 1 lakh car - named Nano - has arrived.

Announcing the launch of the car, the Tata Group Chairman, Mr Ratan N. Tata, said on Thursday that the 623 cc model has been priced at Rs 1 lakh and not more. He said in spite of the fact that the price of steel, rubber and other sundry inputs had gone up during the last four years when the announcement was made, Tata Motors decided to keep the price at Rs 1 lakh at dealers’ sites. “Because promise is a promise,” Mr Tata announced at the launch during the 9th Auto Expo.

The price is expected to be between Rs 1.27 lakh and Rs 1.30 lakh after taking into account transportation costs as well as 12.5 per cent VAT. Nano has passed all crash tests and is also Euro IV compliant though either of these norms are still not applicable for any of the cars in India.

The development cost of the Nano project was around Rs 1,700 crore, very similar to the development cost the company had incurred for the Indica.

With the music from the Stanley Kubrick’s landmark film 2001 Space Odyssey playing in the background, Mr Tata sometimes deviated from his prepared text. Every time he either took a dig at his critics or made an important announcement, it was greeted with a thunderous applause from a nearly 3,000-strong audience which included the former Maruti Suzuki Managing Director, Mr Jagdish Khattar, most of the directors of Tata Sons and car racing star, Mr Narayan Karthikeyan.

“I observed families riding on two-wheelers. The father driving the scooter, his young kid standing in front of him, his wife seated behind him holding a little baby. It led me to wonder whether one could conceive of a safe, affordable, all-weather form of transport for such a family,” Mr Tata said, while explaining how the project was conceived.

Mr Girish Wagh, who authored the highly-popular light commercial vehicle, the Tata Ace, also headed the small car project.

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