Do you know the inspiration behind Tata Nano? Ratan Tata revealed

Ratan Tata remembers his journey in the making of Tata Nano and the idea behind the production of the most affordable car ever seen in the Indian market.

Tata launched Nano as a special project that was close to Ratan Tata, The Chairman Emeritus of Tata Sons. The Tata Nano was one of the most affordable cars that was ever witnessed in the Indian auto market. Ratan Tata, in his latest post on Instagram, reminisces about the Nano while revealing the idea and inspiration behind creating the vehicle. The business mastermind said that Nano was born to be a car for “all our people”, which translates roughly to anyone and for everyone in India.

Tata went on to say that whenever he used to see Indians on scooters especially when a child was sandwiched in between a mother and father and even sometimes with two kids in between, with those rough, slippery roads, he wanted to create a car for people like those. For people who didn’t have the luxury to go on and buy a 5 to 6 lakh rupee car. For them, he wanted to build something.

First, he and the team at his disposal tried to figure out how to make a safer two-wheeler. This led to an inflow of ideas and concepts and even Tata started doodling on the idea. As we all know, he himself belongs to a School of Architecture so he already had a knack for doodling. And while he was working on it, the doodle came out as a car without a door, window and well, the four-wheeler was just a basic dune buggy. And it was that moment when he decided it would be a car. In the words of Ratan Tata, “But I finally decided it should be a car. The Nano was always meant to be a car for all our people”, he wrote.

Launched in the year 2008, Tata Nano instantly became part of many households. It created a buzz around it but that didn’t last long. The production of the car was discontinued in the year 2018 due to low sales of the model. While the Tata was launched, the plan was to sell 250,000 units of the vehicle, and that too, per year. But the maximum sales ever recorded by the car was 74,527 units during Fy2011-2012. After this, sales declined altogether and year after year there was a depreciation in sales numbers which finally led to a negligible market share of the car.

Although, it would be no surprise to see an electric version of the Nano car, as Tata has captured the EV market almost entirely and well, the Nano can be a good option for affordable EVs. Tata already took delivery of a custom-made Nano electric vehicle that was modified using an electric powertrain supplied by Electrodrive Powertrain Solutions Private Limited (Electra EV). The company also supplied a limited number of converted Nano electric vehicles named NEO EVs to Bangaluru-based last0-mile mobility service- SainikPod Sit & Go.