LOTUS POSITION

An affordable back-to-basics sports car that’s made entirely of Indian car parts is every enthusiast’s dream. We take a drive in a prototype to gauge its potential.

No traction control, no ABS, no power steering, no power windows. No windows! The Chinkara is the sporting motorcar unplugged. The motorcar in possibly its purest form. Lithe, light and skinned for speed.

Based in principle on Colin Chapman’s immortal Lotus Seven, like all manner of modern Caterhams and Westfields, it does away with any extraneous mass or weight. The result, a high power-to-weight ratio that in theory should deliver ample performance.

Starved of a decent sports car for decades, a back-to-basics sports car like the Chinkara — which means Indian gazelle — has been what enthusiasts around India have been waiting for.

B uilt by marine boat builder Guido Bothe of Germany and his Indian wife Shama in Alibaug near Mumbai, the Chinkara is fabricated entirely from parts found on Indian cars. Guido, an avid enthusiast and once part-time racer, asked an automobile engineer and friend, Michael Hahn who has worked with Audi in Germany, for a basic design. A simple, easy-to-build tubular chassis on which Indian-made suspension arms could be attached. Ground realities, more specifically our roads, and the fact that Guido is German resulted in a chassis that was built to twice the specification. Not wanting to compromise on structural rigidity in the least, Guido replaced the specified two-inch main chassis tubes on the tubular space-frame with three-inch ones.

Take a look at the massive exhaust pipe-like chassis tubes running out of the rear of the car to get a better idea. The Chinkara as a result is nowhere near as light as an everyday ‘Seven’ and in current form displaces a less-than-featherweight 745kilograms — almost the weight of an Esteem! Bothe does acknowledge the overkill and has plans to pare the weight down.

Just as the original Lotus Seven did, the Chinkara uses suspension parts of very humble origin, more specifically the Maruti 800’s. The rear suspension is also independent and is carried over from the 800 again — it’s the front suspension flipped 180 degrees. Clever. The brakes, discs both front and rear, are also plucked from India’s least expensive car. Power under the long cigar-shaped bonnet comes from the 1.8-litre Isuzu engine that is produced by Hindustan Motors (HM).

The Lotus design clues are clearly visible on the part-fibreglass part-aluminium Chinkara. The basic cigar shape, large tyres, suspended mudguards, strut tower-mounted headlights, rollover bar and the shallow rear with rear strut towers sticking out are all very familiar. Guido’s experience in fibreglass also means that the finish and fit are quite impressive.
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