Vintage car seva is their mantra

When 29-year-old Vinay Gurav finallybought a Gran Turismo Sports (GTS) 175 in 2004, he thought his childhood questfor the bike made famous by the Rishi Kapoor-Dimple Kapadia starrer Bobby wasfinally over. Little did he know the new destinations it would leadto.When his bike was finally ready to ride on Thane���s roads,Gurav began wondering if there were any other collectors of bikes and cars likehim. He began his research and found Edwards Rodrigues��� blog soon after.Three months later they met and the Heritage Vehicle Owners��� Club of Thane(HVOCT) was formed on a hot February morning in 2005.Other memberssoon began trickling in, and currently the club has 45 members with 40 heritagevehicles. Gurav, who became the group���s leader by default and refers tohimself as "this mad person" every now and then, says, "All the group membersare bound by their passion for heritage vehicles." The heritage tagcomprises three categories: Vehicles from the earliest generation to 1910are clubbed under ���antique���, those manufactured from 1911 to 1940are ���vintage��� and vehicles made between 1941 and 1960 are referredto as ���classics���. "Nobody knows who created these definitions,though," Gurav is quick to add. As far as membership goes,there���s a fair amount of leniency: while those who own any vehicle whichis not in production today are eligible to join, those who don���t own aheritage vehicle yet, but hope to some day, are also welcome.Guravintroduces us to the 20-odd members who have gathered at Prakash Shelke���sguesthouse at Thane. It���s an eclectic bunch: Shelke runs a cementbusiness; then there���s a mechanic, an architect, superspeciality doctors,entrepreneurs, businessmen, college students, a plumber, a wireman and even afarmer. The car lovers, whose ages range from 19 to 72 years, share theirexpertise and experience and give tips to other members on how to maintain orobtain spare parts for their vehicles.There are unexpected benefitsof joining the group as well. Gurav owes his current job of business manager toone the members who came to his rally as a curious onlooker. Says Gurav,who���s pretty much done it all from washing plates on handcarts to doingodd jobs at petrol pumps, "I owe everything to the group. I���d be stuck insome dead-end job if I had quelled my passion." The mechanic at HVOCT alsolanded a plum job with a businessman because of the connect between them asmembers.Among some of the rare cars in the group is an Austinconvertible, a beat-up Chevy, a 1971 Lambretta, a Jonga military jeep and a FiatMillicento. The 1955 Millicento has the unique distinction of having drivenJawaharlal Nehru as a passenger, the car���s proud owner Neel Naik informsus.The group has not had a happy relationship with the generalpublic on many occasions. "People still have to learn to respect our vehicles.So often, they come to get their pictures clicked but end up damaging our carsbecause of their eagerness to explore them," says Edward Rodrigues. Adds Gurav,"We all put our money, sweat, blood and time into this. Nobody understands thepain in my heart when I see a scratch on my vehicles. It makes me want to loudlyabuse and kill the person responsible." He himself removes his shiny Casio watchand various rings before cleaning his vehicles. He also changes into a differentset of clothes while washing his vehicles.However, the group has notdivorced itself from the masses. On the contrary, HVOCT plans to organiserallies of its vehicles and generate awareness about old cars. It recently helda rally on jeeps to which representatives from Mahindra & Mahindrawere invited, and where the audience was educated on the history and developmentof jeeps and given a live demonstration on a rocky terrain. The next subject,tentatively, is trucks; it could even be roadrollers if the group sodecides.All HVOCT���s activities stop during the monsoon, as allthe members zealously protect their vehicles from the rains. "Ourvehicles are like jewels. You can���t wear them everyday," quips 37-year-oldDigambar Yadav.The other objective of the group is to help each memberunderstand the real worth of his prized possession. They also try to makenewcomers feel at home and not get overwhelmed by the vehicles the group has tooffer. Gurav predicts that no one from their group will sell theirtreasured vehicles because they know that these are in fact, priceless. Forthis, information on the car and its features, manual, service slips and so onare sought and explained to the owner to inculcate a sense of pride in him abouthis baby. Only when all the information about a model is available can the soulof the vehicle be touched, members feel.Gurav even plans to travelto a small village called Lambro outside Milan where the company that made hisLambretta once stood. "India has such a rich motoring history. But as usual,we���ve lost all our documentation of the pre-Independence period. Did youknow India had at least 25 per cent of the world���s Rolls Royce cars at onetime?" he asks, suddenly animated.The group members claim to sufferfrom sleeplessness till they locate a spare part or a maintenance manual of aparticular vehicle. But ���madman��� Gurav has gone further than most ofthem. "My wife and I have mutually decided not to have kids so that my attentionstays focused on my hobby," he says. After all, the demands of a heritagevehicle, which can be as unpredictable as a child, need a protective father likeGurav.One small detail: there are no women in the group. "Most ofthe wives support us, especially in the last few months after seeing write-upsabout us," members laugh. One of them quips, "How can our wives join us? Car tohunki sauten hai. (For our wives, the vehicle is like the otherwoman.)"The talk then veers to some of the vehicles that the groupis eyeing to add to its already impressive collection. Gurav has areadymade list of vehicles he would like to see his group own. He lists theRocket truck, Dodge truck and the Mahindra FC truck apart from the Seep, anamphibious jeep, a Mini Gaz, old cycles and even buggies. Other members havedeveloped their individual tastes: architect forty-year-old Ravi Nene who hasjust bought his first vintage car, a 1962 Fiat Superselect, has now set eyes onhis next damsel, the curvy little Citroen Deux Chevaux.After someedifying conversation accompanied by refreshments, the group moves out of thefarmhouse (which it refers to as its ���clubhouse���) and continues onits way. En route, a curious bystander stops the Jonga jeep to enquire about it.The other members laugh knowingly. He will be a member soon. "We areall nuts. But there is something to our nuttiness that causes normal people tocome to us," says Gurav, happy with what he feels is the perfect end to his dayand this story. tnn