Crown jewels revealed at Cartier Concours
MAHARAJAS: Classic cars are part of India’s heritage
The fourth Cartier “Travel with Style” Concours d’Elegance, a biennial event which moves from city to city in India, took place at the historical Jaipur Polo Club in New Delhi, located within the Delhi Race Course.
Cartier has enjoyed a longstanding relationship with India and in particular the Maharaja’s dating back to 1911.
They would entrust Cartier to design and set their precious stones into magnificent pieces of jewelry.
The opulence and elegance of the country’s rich automotive legacy has returned to India thanks to the vision and hard work of renowned Indian automotive historian and expert, His Highness Rana Manvendra Singh of Barwani, who hand picks some of the rarest restored and preserved vintage automobiles from across India for the event.
The Cartier Concours has generated great excitement among Indian collectors. More and more owners are now taking an interest in maintaining and restoring their cars to the high standards required for such an International event.
India has a very rich motoring heritage dating back to 1897, when a resident of Calcutta imported the first car into the country.
The following year there were four cars in Bombay, one of them owned by Jamshedji Tata, the Indian pioneer industrialist who founded the Tata Group which today is India’s largest conglomerate.
Ratan Tata is the great grandson of the company founder and Chairman Emeritus of Tata & Son, and was at the Concours viewing the cars on display.
Tata purchased Jaguar and Land Rover from Ford in 2008 for $2.6 billion.
That being the case, I’m sure Tata enjoyed viewing the 1951 Jaguar MKV; it’s a pity there weren’t any old Series I Land Rovers present.
The Maharajas possessed an incredible purchasing power and only purchased the finest things that their money could buy. It should come as no surprise to learn that a quarter of the Rolls-Royce production between 1912 and 1947 went to India.
The Concours is a comparatively young event which focuses on India’s automotive heritage; vehicles are not shipped to India from all over the world like other events. Only vehicles from within India can enter.
I hope that it remains that way because this is what makes it so special, celebrating the distinctiveness of India’s post-Independence automotive heritage and giving people a chance to see some magnificent cars from the esteemed stables of Indian royal patrons and noted private collectors who can be seen walking around the Polo field as others participate in afternoon high tea.