Tata says hello to world's cheapest car

Hot on the heels of the news that Tata is in pole position to take over Jaguar and Land Rover, the Indian car company has revealed its own new model. The Nano is the world's cheapest new car with a price tag of just 100,000 rupees (£1,275) in its native India.

The Nana is a simple four-door, five-seat supermini that uses a two-cylinder 624cc engine mounted at the rear. The engine has been designed to be durable and run on the low-grade fuel that is most common in India. The rest of the car has also been designed to be easily maintained.

Tata's chairman Ratan N. Tata said, “I observed families riding on two-wheelers - the father driving the scooter, his young kid standing in front of him, his wife seated behind him holding a little baby. It led me to wonder whether one could conceive of a safe, affordable, all-weather form of transport for such a family. Tata Motors' engineers and designers gave their all for about four years to realise this goal. Today, we indeed have a People's Car, which is affordable and yet built to meet safety requirements and emission norms, to be fuel efficient and low on emissions."

There's a huge developing market for new cars in India and Tata reckons the Nano is ideally placed to get the country on to four wheels. Environmentalists say that so many Indians swapping bicycles and scooters for a car will have a disastrous effect on emissions and pollution. However, Tata says the Nano has passed emissions standards and returns more than 50mpg.

There are no plans to sell the Nano outside of India at present, but Tata has stated that it intends to be one of the world's largest car makers, building on its position as one of the world's largest commercial vehicle manufacturers.

Alisdair Suttie