Getting back to posting here. One of my favorite songs. She is plain gifted. 

Why the Swift Dzire continues to sell in such huge numbers

Last week was a reunion of sorts. Old friends came down to Delhi for a short holiday in Rajasthan. We had planned to drive and hence hired a couple of Swift Dzire self drive types from Avis.

Since this is not a travelogue, I would like to point out what I liked about the car.
The cars we were driving were pretty run down one having done 65k and the other around 85k, pretty high considering that this is a rental.

Few scratches and dents apart the car was a shiny gaga black. Personally I do not like the shape of the Dzire as the boot attached to a Swift does not necessarily make it look good. My choices apart, Maruti have created the ideal package for the value searching Indian consumer. A petrol sedan at 5.5 lakhs and a diesel one at 6, both with engines proven in India are runaway box office successes. And so it has been. More than two years since its launch, DZire continues to command unmatched demand for any sedan and even manages to outsell some of the hatches in the Indian market.

The diesel one though commands more interest and the ones that we driving were diesels too. That gave me an ample opportunity to check as to what makes this car tick.

The highway driving on this car in the normal rev bands in okay, the kinds you tend to expect, smooth, though at times you feel the sense of a turbo lag in the 1600-1800 rpm band. Press the pedal and in kicks the turbo at around 1900-2000 rpm. It is an exhilarating feeling for someone who is driving a diesel car for the first time. The zip from 80 - 120 kph is seriously noticeable. It sort of pushes you back in your seat. I personally loved it.

For those who want to kick out of a traffic jam in city driving, the numerous ones that we faced in Jaipur. The turbo does kick in nicely if press the pedal and zoom you are on your way. Though I would personally prefer my petrol swift for tackling city traffic. A high revving petrol motor appeals to me more for my daily use.

Now comes an intermittent leg of our journey, a drive from Jaipur to Ajmer. This is where we saw the full top end power of the diesel kicking in. One of the cars clocked 160 kph (impressive by any means). Moreover the Dzire coninues to give the unmatched road feel which not too many cars in the Indian market match up to.

Now the best part, this 1248cc 4-cyl DDIS rev-happy diesel motor returned a measly 21 kmpl on our return trip. Kick ass indeed. This is why it fits into the Indian dream car definition. Quick, good to drive and very fuel efficient.

Only if Maruti put in some though to the interiors. The OEM ICE lacks the punch. The nose drones out due to the engine noise. maybe aftermarket speakers could solve the problem.

Nuff said..
Cheers..

What are the levels of service that you should expect as a consumer ?

Vir Sanghvi's weekend column on Hindustan Times, Rude Food, depicting the quality of service levels that you come to expect in India these days.

My experiences over the weekend were rather on similar lines as presented in Mr. Sanghvi's post only that it did not happen at any CCD outlet but at a car showroom.

The car that we own is 3 years old and we had purchased it using a bank loan. To our surprise, we saw that that even after paying 36 EMI's we still had another EMI due. Considering that we had paid an advance along with an initial amount when booking the car we assumed that we would have to pay 35 more EMI's. We got in touch with the concerned bank straightaway and the explanation that they provided was satisfactory, that they had started deducting the monthly installment amounts after the disbursement of the loan. Checking the statements also showed that they were correct. So why would we be paying 37 EMI's instead of 36. Here we got in touch with the Maruti dealer in Noida form whom we had purchased the car, Vipul Motors.

A certain assistant general manager of the showroom Mr. Singh, welcomed us. I took great pains to explain the problem making it clear that we had paid 37 EMI's instead of 36. He tried to explain something and then said that since he was not sure he would get back to us in a couple of days. He took our phone numbers promising to get back as soon as possible.

The wait begun, a week, two...it seemed never ending. So after exactly three weeks, I visited their showroom again last Saturday. Once again we are greeted with this blank smile. Out tumbles the excuses, "Main apka file..nikaal ke rakha tha..mil nahin raha hain.". Ok we say, so did you clarify the issue that we had pointed out.

Now when we managed to coerce them into finding the file, I asked the manager that what is it that took so long. He said that my father expired. On hearing this I said sorry, but lets get down to the business. What followed was an arduos three hours of haggling with him and the finance manager of Vipul Motors. The entire explanations that they were coming up were hilarious to say the least.
Seriously I have not seen anyone do math that way, not in my lifetime.

At the end of every round of calculations, we arrived at the conclusion they 12000 in the negative. I finally lost it, saying they could keep the money as change. Arseholes as they are, they gleefully agreed. The attitude with the car dealers especially Maruti in the NCR region is that aas long as you are a wannabe customer, they will even lick your ass, but once you buy a car they simply forget you. Neither behavior is in anyway desirable. I do not think I am the only person to suffer in their hands, I know of a few others who have faced this.

The problem was finally semi-amicably solved when they agreed that their salesman, a certain gentleman called Ankit ( i dont remember his full name) had managed to siphon both us and the dealer of the money. Not that it affects the dealer much, they have got what was due to them. It is customers like us who are the ones to suffer and there is nothing much that we can do in this respect. Albiet I would be doubly careful the next time I go to buy a car. And please get evverything in written from the dealer. The salesmen around are easily the most easygoing liars that you will ever find.

Nuff Said..

Cheers

A Different Pujo...

This is the first time in my not so short existence, that I have decided to give the Pujo in Kolkata a miss.

But after 28 succesive pujos at 9 Mandeville Gardens, I have decided I would give Kolkata a miss.

So to a very Happy Durga Pujo to all of you.

Eat drink and make merry.

Cheers

Take a bow

Ladies and gentlemen, take a bow.

MC Mary Kom has won her fifth world championship title. You might not have heard much about her feat till Sachin Tendulkar heaped praises on her achievements.

If you want to learn more about her

http://www.marykom.com/marykom/index.php

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Kom


We need more champions like her who have braved the odds to win. I hope she brings home 2012 Olympics gold.

Cheers

What went wrong with England ?

This is the second part of my analysis of a few team from the World Cup. I had started off with France in one of my previous posts. Now its time for some English bashing.

England came into this World Cup as one of the favorites alongside Brazil,Spain and Argentina. I still do not understand why they were labelled as favorites. Yes they were on a good run in the Qualifiers.They were in a pretty simple group where Croatia were the ones they posed any threat. The matchups were hyped even further as Crotia beat them twice in the Euro 2008 qualifiers. A comprehensive beating of Croatia gave the English media and fans a sort of self belief that maybe they never had in the last 6 years.

The Euro 2008 debacle was long forgotten in the run up to South Africa. England now had a new coach in Fabio Capello, a man with pretty decent coaching credentials. He had managed a couple of Europes top clubs in AC Milan and Real Madrid.

This engine of this England unit is still based on England's golden generation of the 2000's, (they have one every decade). This set of players included Terry,Gerrard,Lampard and Owen. Michael Owen unfortunately had fallen out of favour with Capello. The hype was huge. Rooney was having the seasson of his life at United. Four months before the world cup things were about to change.

Rio Ferdinad got injured while on club duty, Garreth Barry is injured towards the end of the season, lampard a minor knock and then the major blow that I thought was the turning point. Wayne Rooney is injured in the first leg of the Champions league 1/4 final against Bayern Munich. He is taken off. He forces himself to play the second leg and then Van Bommel(I would dedicate a blog on him later), gets the better of him ina tackle. Rooney has to go off, United lose, their season derails. Such was his form last year that he could alone have taken them to league and CL glory. Rooney never recovered and so did England.

England's opening Group B fixture was against the USA, a good team coached by Bob Bradley. In their ranks they had a quite afew good players who plied their trade in the Premier League. England were still the favorites going into the game. Their captain for the world cup, Rio Ferdinand took the flight home before the first game. David Beckham suffered a really bad injury at Milan and was ruled out for 9 months atleast. He took his place on the coaching staff. Coming back from injury were Rooney and Ashley Cole arguably the only two world class players in the English setup. Gareth Barry figured in Capello's central scheme of things in the run up to the cup. His injury was a setback to their preparations.

Capello's team selection left a lot to be desired. With Barry out of the team for the first game, he preferred to play James Millner, the young midfielder from Aston Villa. Lest I forget, dropping Walcott from the 25 man squad which was announced caused the maximum flutters all round. Walcott plays on the right wing and he was competing for a place with the likes of Aron Lenon and Shaun Wright Philips. Lenon has good pace on the wings, but he would have been better off plying his trade in sprints rather than on the football field. His clubs performance in the league last season was also one of the factors that contributed to his call up to the team. Wright Philips continues to be a boy wonder, his height and his boyish looks at 32 maybe helps create this notion, but I think he will remain one all through.

So England start off the first game with Rooney and Heskey upfront, with Gerrard playing in a widish left position behind them. Millner links up play to Gerrad from the back. Lenon plays out right and surprising Lampard plays the role of the central midfielder. The defence consists of Glen Johnson on the right, the Liverpool man who makes good runs down the right but his crosses leave a lot to be desired. Tracking back during a counter attack is again not one of his favorite things. The central defence consists of Terry and King. Mr. Chelsea, John Terry was not having the best of seasons which was compunded even further by off-field problems. Ledley King was in inspite of his no practice only matchday football condition because there was no once good enough other than him to play in the centre of the defence alongside Terry. Ashley Cole played in the left back position. Cole is a super player, whose speed moving up and his ability to stop the best i business on the right side have won him accolades the world over. Inspite of all this he has never shown his best form for England. Cole's biggest achievent in his carrer was the way he took to Cristiano Ronaldo when the latter was playing for United. I remember game when ronaldo had to moved out right or to a more central position in matched agianst Chelsea to nullify the Cole threat. Make no mistake as CR7 was voted the World Player of the year that season. In goal for England you had Robert Green, the West Ham United man, a controverisal choice considering they had the eccentric David James and Joe Hart to chose from. Hart was coming off a brilliant loan season at Birmingham City, a performance that has seen him replace Shay Given as the first choice keeper at Eastlands.

Stevie Gerrard put England ahead after he combined well with Heskey. That I think was the only high point for England at the World Cup. USA equalied through a Clint Dempsey strike which I think was more of a Green howler. Robert Green it seemed had BP oil on his hands and the Americans slipped one through. Millner got injured in the first half(replaced by the boy wonder) and King was replaced by Carragher. The game was a disaster. Luckily England managaed to retrieve a point from it. They were plain lucky.

As I finish the first part of the English bashing I would like to ask a few things to M/s Cappello and Pearce.

1. Why was Walcott not included in the squad of 25 ? Are Lenon and Wright Philips better ? Didnt Capello watch Walcott play the Champions league game against Barcelona ?

2. With Barry not sure whether we would play the group games, why did Capello play Carrick in the warm up games only to replace him with Millner. Playing Carrick simply has its own advantages. The quality of Carrick's distribution is better than Barry/Millner on any given day. As for the defensive qualities, all of them can be rated at the same level. For me England sorely missed Hargreaves in th centre of midfield, his longterm injury meant he missed a lot of football.

3. Even after failing for 3-4 times at major competitions why wasthe Lampard - Gerrard combo tried out. Lampard somehow never manages to link up with Gerrard and Capello should have taken note of that. Gerrard links well with Rooney and the huge number of goals in the qualifiers gave Capello a false sense of confidene.

4. With all this central midfield option what harm would it have done Capello to bring Scholes out of retirement, something which he just did not have th guts to do.

5. This brings me to the goalkeeper. Why was Ben Foster in the reckoning, when he was having a horrid time at United. The first choice goalkeeper was never decided. Capello it seems gambled on Green right on the morning of the game but alas it did not pay off. Hart for me would anyday have been better option.

6. Micheal Owen may have fallen out favor with Capello. He may not play again as long as Capello is the boss. But if Capello was playing a 4-4-2 in the first place I would play Crouch because of his aerial superiority and his ability to climb over the opposition and score. With his pruned team he should definitely have played a 4-5-1. But again I do not have a coaching badge. How can Heskley play international football, the guy just dosemt have it in him. Crouch and Defoe are a million times better.

Will continue on the England story and also on the basic issue...

Is the Fed-Ex era in tennis over ?

It been a while since I have been up all night watching a game of tennis. Last Saturday night/Sunday morning, I decided I would watch the Federer v Djokovic semifinal. I had not watched a single match at the US open this year. I had been reading reports of Federer's form this year at Flushing Meadows. There was a lot to write home about or so the newspapers would have me believe. The match report of the 1/4 final vs soderling was ample evidence that the great man had regained some sort of form.

2010 has been one of Federer's worst years on the tour. He really didnt have much to show after the Australian Open win in January. There was an injury setback in March which kept him off the tour for a while only to make a comeback three weeks before Paris.
Paris has been a place where more often than not he has come up second best to Rafa. Even though he had won last year, Nadal was in top form and the most optimistic of Federer fans wouldnt have backed him to win this time around. Federer's come back to form was halted rather early by Soderling who put in a sterling performance to erase his 0-12 head to head carrer record against Fed-Ex. The worst though was yet to come...

Day 1, The Championships,Wimbledon. Defending champion Roger Federer V unknown Colombian Alejandro Falla. 90 minutes of tennis and Federer is 2 sets down. Third set, everyone expects a federer comeback, instead he is down a couple of match points. The great champion that he is, digs deep and finds a way to win the game. Federer never looked so fallible. Come the 1/4 finals he loses to Berdych. Huge shock on Day 9 of the Championships. The All England Club is still coming to terms with the loss me thinks :-P

The vulnerability that has crept into his game this year was something that has never been seen. He dropped to number 3 in the rankings for the forst time in maybe 6 years.

Now why I think the era of the Roger is coming to an end.
1. His ground strokes are'nt as lethal as they used to be. They are still very good, but unforced errors have crept in.
2. The new guys, hit the ball so hard that at times it seems that during long rallies Federer can in no way get past the other guy. The defensive game of these players is again very very good. They run everything down.
3. If you observe closely that this on the rise smack of the ball has also ensured that he has had to resort to use the drop shot far too often. Fantastic change to his game and on his day people generally do not manage to get to the drops.
4. His single handed backhanded versus Nadal's top spinning curler, something that he has never managed to control.
5. The problem with ground strokes has led him to depend on his serve too much. Make no mistake he has one of the best serves ever but then there might be a day (last Saturday) where you manage to put in 55 percent of your first serves. The opponent dosent have much to do. Lots of second serves to attack and slice defense can be breached by some real hard hitting.
6. Too many unforced errors have crept into his game.

Federer dosent seem to be the master that he used to be. He is still one of the greats to have played the game and I just hope that he keeps winning more grand slams. I want him in more finals, playing Nadal in some awesome matches like the 2008 Wimbledon. It is the best game of tennis that I have ever watched.

Though I now doubt whether we would see matches of that quality in the near future..