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A prototype Tata Nano at the development facility in Pune waits in line for engineers to put it through a battery of tests. The main factory in Singur, in West Bengal, is still under construction, and this is one of only a handful of existing Nanos.
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The Tata Nano has only a single large windshield wiper instead of the standard two. There is also just one side mirror, on the driver's side. The lack of mirrors could be considered a liability in the unpredictable Indian traffic, where knowing what is happening around you at all times is especially important.
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The display model of the Tata Nano that appeared onstage in New Delhi has not re-entered the research stream. On the far right in front of the car, Girish Wagh, head engineer on the small car project, supervises my inspection of the Nano.
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Researchers keep a list of problems on the red-prototype Nano in the facility in Pune. These relatively minor issues are mostly small fitting problems like “ORVM stem orientation not ok.†Taken note of several months before the Nano goes into production in West Bengal, these issues most likely will be sorted out by the time the car hits the streets.
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The demonstration car that appeared at the auto exhibition in New Delhi is getting ready for a ride on the Buzz, Squeal, and Rattle Machine. The BSR is a system of computerized hydraulic pistons that simulate Indian road conditions in a laboratory setting.
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Head engineer Girish Wagh looks like any other engineer at the Tata plant, except that the people on his staff defer to him with respect. He helped design a light truck called the Tata Ace several years ago, before being put in charge of the Nano project by Ravi Kant himself.
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Executive director of Tata Sons Alan Rosling is an OBE (something like a knight) in the United Kingdom and special adviser to former prime minister John Major. Now he plans for Tata's expansion into global markets.
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Ashwin Mahesh is a founder of Mapunity in Bangalore, a think tank that tracks all traffic in Bangalore in order to provide tech-savvy solutions to congestion. He doesn't think that the Tata Nano will have a catastrophic effect on Indian traffic; the real problem, rather, is India's poor ability to manage the cars that are already on the road.
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Leo Saldanha is a commanding force in the environmental activist scene in Bangalore. As one of the founding members of the Environmental Support Group, he believes that the Nano will cause catastrophic congestion on Bangalore's poorly managed streets and add to already emergency levels of air and noise pollution. And, yes, that's Wired writer Scott Carney taking the photo in the mirror on the right side of the frame. Oops.
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