The world's cheapest car, the Tata Nano, will appear on the streets of India for the first
time Friday, six years after it was conceived.
The keys of the first
Nano, manufactured by Tata Motors, were expected to be presented to
the owner of first car the leave dealership by the head of the company, Ratan
Nata, in Mumbai. The recipient's name, time of the delivery and type of Nano being
delivered were not readily available. About 100,000 people
were selected by a ballot to be the first recipients of the Nano,
which reviewers have compared to the European Smart car and the Volkswagen Beetle.
The remaining first Nano deliveries, transported by train to Mumbai in July, are expected in September. Tata
launched the Nano in March, predicting the no-frills vehicle would
revolutionize travel for millions of Indians, who previously couldn't
afford a car.
Only seven in
1,000 people in India own a car. About 550 per 1,000 people in
Germany own a car. Three
versions of the Nano went on sale in April: the basic model and more
expensive CX and LX models, which have extra features like
air-conditioning, automatic windows and central locking.The
standard model sells for 140,000 rupees ($2,800) while the models
cost as much as 185,000 rupees ($3,800).
Tata Motors is India’s
top vehicle maker. It recently reported its first quarterly loss in
eight years, largely based on the poor sales of luxury British
carmaker Jaguar Land Rover, which it bought from Ford last year.
Despite its long-term
successes, the Nano has garnered Tata its greatest notoriety based one unique specifications: It's a four-door, five-seat, 10-foot
automobile with a 2-cylinder, 33-horsepower, 624cc engine and a five-speed (four forward) manual transmission.
Although the debut
of the Nano has been much anticipated, it is not without controversy.
Disagreements involving where the car should be built prompted
production delays. And critics of vehicle fear the Nano will further
crowd India's already clogged roads and add to the country's
pollution woes.
Newsweek magazine
described the Nano as part of a “new breed of 21st century cars
that embody a contrarian philosophy of smaller, lighter, cheaper and
portend a new era in inexpensive personal transportation — and
potentially global gridlock.”
The Nano will have a spare tire, but it can
only be used to replace only the front tires. Only the driver’s
seat is adjustable in the base model and the CX model will have air
conditioning and a heater. The LX model will have power windows,
central locking and fog lamps. The Nano will have a warranty of 18
months or 24,000 kilometers (approximately 15,000 miles).
Tata
also is planning to offer various merchandise — phone to watches —
bearing the Nano name.
The name Nano derives from the Greek prefix “nanos.” It means dwarf. Nano also
means "small" in Gujarati, the native language of the Tata
family, founders of the Tata Group.
