Tata Elxsi, Tata Group’s design arm, is partnering Tata Motors for the project is all-set to experiment with driverless cars for the first time on the Indian soil at its headquarters in Bangalore, Karnataka.
In western world, the driverless cars are fast becoming reality, but there is no wind about the autonomous car in India. Looking at the traffic situation of India, forget about the foreign brand even our own home-grown car makers have not tried their self-driving machines in the country.
Pictured is the Tata Tiago that has already begun testing as a driverless car in the UK.
According to Business Standard, Tata Motors has already begun simulating and testing autonomous cars at a facility on the outskirts of Bangalore. The company has reportedly re-engineered two sedans, out of which one is Zest from Tata Motors equipped with Lidar radars, stereoscopic camera and ultrasonic sensors. An onboard computer will receive inputs from these sensors and make necessary corrections, braking and acceleration inputs to the car systems, resulting in autonomous driving.
Tata’s self-driving car program will be much unique compared to the other autonomous car programs, that are just limited to the developer, Tata Elxsi is open to be a supplier of underlying software platform for other carmakers. “What we are developing will be useful in many ways for OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and supplier of parts. It will provide them a platform to get more research and development faster than ever,” Nitin Pai, the head of marketing at Tata Elxsi, according to the report.
Funded by the UK government, the program is jointly partnered with Tata Motors, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) and Ford.
Even Google CEO Sundar Pichai who recently came to India, has stated that “In India, there won’t be any driverless cars”. He meant that the driverless cars can work where the roads are smooth and people follow traffic rules. Both these attributes are missing in India. In fact, breaking traffic rules is a badge of honour for most Indians. If people see a driverless car in India, they will honk at it, they will bang into it just for the heck of it.
Also unruly pedestrians, disorderly drivers, reckless auto-rickshaws, a variety of slow-moving carts, darting dogs, and the occasional elephant, Indian roads are really something else.
Driverless cars will work in India if 99.99% car owners switched to them, if we have driverless autos, if we have driverless trucks, if we have driverless buses, if we have driverless tempos, if we have driverless motorbikes (very important) and if we have driverless scooters. Unless that happens, no driverless cars for India.
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Also see: Tata Motors latest invention – The driverless Tata Car!
