Rise and Fall of Contessa

Hi, remember me? These days you would see me mostly in the scrap yards or 'rusting' in peace in some god forsaken places. But I wish to tell everyone, especially the Smartphone generation, that I had seen much better days in the past.

I hit the road sometime around 1982 when my older cousin Amby (Ambassador) had already ruled the Indian roads for three decades. My sleek looks and plush interiors came as a whiff of fresh air among the Indian public, grown tired of  ‘bowler hat’ Amby, cramped Premier and Standard.

For the Indian consumer this was some sort of a great leap forward in terms of  aspiration. Over  the preceding three decades he just had Amby, Premier and Standard to choose from and the car makers literally took him for a ride by introducing new 'models' with changes that were at best cosmetic - most notably the front grille.

The only noteworthy competitor back then was Standard 2000 modeled on Rover SD1 but that was for a short while as it ran into some licensing issues with Rover and faded away by 1987. On the other hand I soon grew more muscle, powered by an 1.8 L Isuzu engine, and acquired a suffix 'Classic' to my name.

The eighties was a smooth ride for me and I soon became some sort of a status symbol. The political and bureaucratic class courted me over my jaded cousin Amby and the nouveau riche, spawned by the liberalising Indian economy, coveted me to show off that they have 'arrived'.

I had become an undisputed king in the 1000 plus cc segment (there were no A, B segments back then) and the diesel version in 1990 only strengthened my grip. 

Meanwhile, Maruti-Suzuki was busy eliminating competition in the small car segment with its Maruti 800. I still vaguely remember the catch line in print ads about me back then 'A limousine that refused to join the rat race' (or words to that effect).  A dig at the Maruti's diminutive offering.

I hit the first speed bump when Maruti 1000 came along in 1990, however since it was overpriced and underpowered, my makers hardly saw it as a concern. But the wily Maruti refused to give up and in 1994 came up with a more powerful and upgraded Esteem and sales graph of my petrol version took a gentle dip.

But even this failed to wake up my engineers and soon we paid dearly as GM, Ford, Fiat, Tata and Hyundai came calling with more contemporary and sleeker models. My arch rival Maruti Esteem soon became the big daddy of the mid size segment, thanks to its first mover advantage and extensive service network.

I got phased out in 2002 owing to stiff competition and my cousin Amby too suffered badly due to it.

However it is heartening to know that I still have a handful of admirers who see me as the first Indian muscle car - reminiscent of the American muscle cars of 1960s and '70s.