A car with a 12 month waiting period in the 80s ruled the Indian roads for over 3 decades

A thread on Ambassador cars 🧵

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1956, UK - Morris Motors manufactured and sold 3 variants of Morris Oxford car

It sold the rights and tooling for these cars to Hindustan Motors, a subsidiary of CK Birla group to manufacture and sell these cars in India

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1956 - Morris Oxford Series 1 model was branded as Hindustan 10, Series 2 as Landmaster and Series 3 model as the Ambassador

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Out of the 3 cars, Ambassador was the best both in terms of looks, space and ruggedness required for Indian roads. It cost around 14000 Rs in 1958 when the production started

It was positioned as the family car given the kind of space available for bigger Indian families

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At that time, there were not many indian automobile brands. Standard 10 and Mahindra's Jeep were the only major car brands available.

The government controlled production and was encouraging domestic production. This helped all these 3 players

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