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CAP Blog > CAP Blog > Martin's Blog
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Dec
9
Written by:
Martin Ward
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
They do say there isn’t a bad car to be built any more these days, but this car has to be the exception to the rule. The car I rented at Malaga airport last weekend was the Indian built Tata Indica, a car that has never graced our shores and hopefully never will. It did however, come into the country back in 2004 under the guise of a Rover Cityrover and was sold up until the collapse of MG Rover. The Cityrover was basically the Indica with different badges and we were told at the time that more thorough checks and better quality was guaranteed. This claim was dubious at the time.
 I was asked for 39euros at the rental desk and I told the young lady that I only wanted to rent it and not buy it. The car had covered around 8,000kms and it looked and drove as if it had done at least ten times that amount. It was this year’s model but its style was more reminiscent of a car from the seventies.
 The interior was made with poor quality materials and there were plenty of large gaps to be seen in between the plastics. The positioning of the seats seemed to be too high; it was very uncomfortable and I soon got a severe back ache after just 30 minutes, so what it would be like on a long journey isn’t worth thinking about.
The 1.4 litre diesel engine was harsh and was best described by my dad who is 85 and slightly deaf. He said “the engine is very noisy and it rattles” - a fair description I thought. The turbo whistled like no other turbo I have heard before and whilst driving up some of the long inclines in southern Spain, it really did struggle despite the turbo whistling its head off.
However, we cannot forget that this car was not really designed for the Europeans and in its home country and surrounding countries that are not quite as sophisticated as ours, it would certainly do the job and the owners will be proud of their Indica. It seats five people in relative comfort, squeezes two suitcases into the boot and has a high roof which is tall enough for somebody to get in with a top hat on.
I took some photographs of the Tata with some really spectacular backgrounds, but even this scenery didn’t make the Indica look any better.
 Whoever took the decision not to import this car into the UK was certainly very wise and if MG Rover had stayed in business and had to rely on the Cityrover’s sales to keep them afloat, then it wouldn’t have lasted much longer anyway.There are some very good cars produced in India such as the Hyundai i10 and Nissan Pixo, but if the Indica or its successor ever has plans to come here, then it has to be a whole lot better than my rental car.
And now to the positive side: I only had to drive it for three days and with a bit of luck, I will never have to drive one again.
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