Thursday, April 23, 2009

People’s Car: The Tata Nano drives into Nagaland

Tata Nano - ( View In Large Size)Image by bbjee via Flickr

Dimapur | April 22: The much hyped Tata Nano car, or in the words of Ratan Tata ‘the people’s car’, has finally reached Nagaland. A ‘Demo Version’ (demonstration version) of the car reached Dimapur on Tuesday, April 21, which was then let open for public display at the Zhimomi Automobiles showroom located at Circular Road from Tuesday.

According to the Manager of Zhimomi Automobiles it was supposed to have reached Dimapur by the 9th of April but due to some ‘technical problems’ it could arrive only on April 21.

Zhimomi Automobiles, being the only Tata dealer in the whole of Nagaland, was flooded with interested customers and curious onlookers from the time the showroom opened on Tuesday morning and was packed till 5 pm, closing time, in the evening. Interested buyers would have to fill out an application form which will be available at the showroom for three hundred rupees. Those from other districts of the State can get the form at any of the State Bank of India branches of Nagaland, reason being the limited edition of the car. It seems not everybody will be fortunate enough to own a Nano this time as only one lakh models of the car will roll out from the factories for commercial sale in the first batch for the whole of India.

The Manager of the showroom said that near up to a thousand enquiries have been made about the car from prospective buyers so far. An employee added that 300 to 400 people came to check out the car from morning till noon on Wednesday.

Response being overwhelming, for booking the car any interested buyer must fill up one form for Rs.300 which will continue till April 25. After the said date, the lucky first time owners of the car will be decided through lottery at the Tata headquarters. For the ‘unfortunate’ ones, they will have to wait till the next edition. For refunds, they would have to give prior indication in the application form whether they prefer a refund in the event of not making it in the lottery. In case they prefer to wait for the next edition, the amount paid will remain with company.

The price of the Nano (subject to change) will range from model to model. The base model (Nano BS) will cost between Rs.1,30,922 to Rs.1,36,922 only, the mid range version or the Deluxe model (Nano CX) will be in the range of Rs.1,55,921 to Rs.1,64,966 only, while the luxury model (Nano LX) will be in the range of Rs.1,88,091 only. The cost difference of the car from Guwahati and here (Dimapur), it is heard, will vary from three to four thousand rupees.

Aside from the appealing low cost of the car, the Nano is said to give a mileage of 24 km/litre of petrol, but this would depend on the nature of roads. How well the car combats the ‘infamous’ roads of Nagaland remains to be seen until August (the month when it is expected to hit the roads).

Source: Morung Express

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

No comments:

Post a Comment