Why is Maruti Suzuki so successful in India for so many years?

?

To understand why Suzuki is still famous and why nobody could imagine any other company sharing its name with Maruti, we need to understand the history of Maruti Suzuki.

During the early 1970s, Mr. Sanjay Gandhi (youngest son of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi) took the responsibility of producing and delivering India's first people's car after his mother's cabinet proposed the idea. Sanjay was a petrolhead, having returned from the UK after not completing an internship programme at Rolls Royce. He founded?Maruti Udyog Ltd in 1971.

A factory was also built in Gurgaon by then and Sanjay Gandhi became its first Managing Director at the age of 25.

?

Mr. Sanjay Gandhi with the first, locally produced prototype of the Maruti at the Maruti Factory in Gurgaon, Early 1970s.

Since the prototype he produced wasn't upto the standards, he contacted many car companies such as Volkswagen, Honda for a joint collaboration. However, both companies didn't have a suitable model for India at the price of ?5000-?7000 (the targeted price for the Maruti in 1970s). By 1975, he didn't have a single model to produce and was facing a loss as he had invested his own money. However, this was a small hurdle compared to what came on 21st June 1975.

The Indian Emergency of 1975–1977 put a hold on Sanjay's plans for Maruti and also destroyed his own and his mother's reputation. Both lost the elections in 1977 and BJP( then known as Janata Party) came into power which made it compulsory to dissolve the company as a sort of revenge for the atrocities of the emergency.

However, Congress came back again in 1980 by winning the elections and even after 1977, Sanjay diverted his focus to gather a stronghold in Politics.

By the time his mother became the Prime Minister in 1980, he was set to revamp the Maruti Operations but he died in a fateful airplane crash in the same year in New Delhi, crashing his plane near his own backyard.

His mother paid tribute to him by getting the matter into her own hands and calls for collaborations were made again. By coincidence, some Suzuki engineers were in India for a business visit and came to know that the Goverment is looking for a 60–40 collaboration to produce a locally assembled foreign car. When the engineers came to know that the goverment had previously contacted VW & Honda, Suzuki came all guns out and made it a top priority to win the deal which they eventually did by planning to produce their successful Alto. The deal was made in 1981 by showing the first prototype, which if Mr Sanjay Gandhi was alive, would've been highly impressed.

The Gurgaon factory was modernized to produce the car in large numbers and a complex distribution/dealership network was also planned. The final model was produced for the Government in mid 1983 and it was launched in the Indian market in December 1983.

Boasting a price tag of ?43,000 for the base variant and ?50,000 for the DX, the 800 not only undercut the already old Hindustan Ambassador and Fiat Premier Padmini, it had many segment first features, factory fitted air conditioning, lively petrol engine, hatchback design, impressive fuel economy, robust and easy servicable mechanicals. Running costs were drastically low than the competition. The company further revolutionized the market by the launching many new cars such as the Omni (First MUV) in 1984, Gypsy in 1985, 1000 (1989, first ever modern three box sedan in the market, most expensive car at the time), Zen in 1993 (first ever modern and up to date hatchback at the time) and many others to this day.

The company has always focused on consumer satisfaction providing easy assistance to the owners. Marutis are reliable, fun to drive, robust and easy to maintain and its all because?Suzuki understood the market requirements of India and acted upon them.

Mr Sanjay Gandhi, if he were alive today, would proudly drive a Maruti.