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India's 1980s cars: Ambassador, Padmini, Maruti 800, Contessa | Gone But Not Forgotten | evo India

A decade when the Indian government, locked in its socialist mindset, decided that its citizens could choose between the Hindustan Ambassador and the Premier Padmini. And yet, this decade gave India some of its most iconic Indian cars, vehicles that an entire generation was born in, grew up in, and will never forget. In this special Gone But Not Forgotten episode, we revisit Indian cars in the 1980s. We cover all seven of them in this Indian car history episode. The Hindustan Ambassador, tracing its lineage back to the 1954 Morris Oxford, India's first diesel car and the undisputed car of the baboos. The Premier Padmini, whose story begins with the radical Fiat 1100 at the 1953 Geneva Motor Show, runs through its Indian motorsport career with the legendary Black Beauty racing car, and ends as a cautionary tale about apathy and a company that filed for bankruptcy in 2018. The Hindustan Contessa was designed by Wayne Cherry (Vauxhall Victor Fe), who later designed the Corvette C5. It was initially crippled by a 1950s engine and later transformed by an Isuzu 1.8-litre engine. The Premier 118 NE, yes! We know the resemblance to Lada, with the smoothest, most precise gearbox any Indian car had ever offered and a factory that made customers wait six years for delivery. And the Maruti Omni, a van that became a school bus, an ambulance, a taxi, and yes, Bollywood's vehicle of choice for kidnapping scenes, discontinued after 35 years, not because of poor sales, but because it simply could not meet crash safety norms. Then, on 14th December 1983, Indira Gandhi handed over the keys to the very first Maruti 800 to Harpal Singh, who had won one in a lottery. This was the fulfilment of Sanjay Gandhi's dream of a people's car for India, a dream he had pursued from a licence agreement with Maruti Suzuki signed on Rajiv Gandhi's birthday. At ₹47,500 ex-factory, it introduced India to front-wheel drive, disc brakes, a floor-mounted gearshift, and most importantly, Japanese build quality. Nothing broke down. That was revolutionary. In two months, production for the next three years was sold out. This is the Maruti 800 launch story that changed Indian automotive history forever. And the Mahindra Jeep from the CJ-series, descended from the Willys Jeep that helped win the Second World War, assembled in India from 1954, was never technically a car, but it was the backbone of a nation: defence, border patrol, flood relief, plantations, police. The Mahindra Jeep history is the history of independent India itself. This is classic Indian cars content, unlike anything else, the full story of where these machines came from, what they meant, and why they still matter. Whether you grew up in an Ambassador, waited years for a Premier 118 that never came, or remember the exact moment a Maruti 800 first appeared in your neighbourhood, this is your episode. Subscribe now because the next episode features India in the 1990s, when the economy opened up and everything changed. 0:00 Introduction 2:39 Hindustan Ambassador 9:29 Premier Padmini 16:06 Maruti 800 SS80 21:13 Maruti Omni 24:10 HM Contessa 27:08 Fiat 118NE 31:32 Mahindra Major #evoIndia #gonebutnotforgotten #indiancars Want more #ThrillOfDriving videos? Subscribe to the evo India channel: https://bit.ly/2VfzioP Read our stories here: https://evoindia.com/ Buy #EvoIndiamagazine here: www.evoindia.com/magazine Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/evoindia/ Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/evoindia/ Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/evoindia Official merchandise on 100kmph: http://www.100kmph.com/evoindia