Until now I
had only heard of sapphires, as in Ruby, Emerald and Sapphire?
All these three are the most precious and expensive stones in the world,
Some times even more costly than Diamonds! Of the three, Ruby is red,
Emerald is green and Sapphire is blue. All three of these are basically CORRUNDUM – which is a naturally occurring crystalline form of
Aluminium Oxide– such as AL2O3. In Hindi Diamond
is Heera, Pearl is Moti, and Manik is Ruby, Emerald and Sapphire, such
that red Manik is Ruby, green Manik is Emerald and blue Manik is Sapphire.
So I began wondering. Why has a four stroke scooter been named Saffire?
Choice of such a name is not surprising. We have thousands of examples
of people being named Heera(lal), Moti(lal) and Manik(chand). As seen
above, Manik is Sapphire, so naming a scooter as Sapphire is not surprising,
though changing the spelling from Sapphire to Saffire is somewhat out
of ordinary, even though perfectly logical. Using the KISS principal –
the 'ff' in saffire is simpler to read, write, spell and remember than
'pph' in sapphire ! (KISS principal = Keep It Simple Stoopid).
 And
to boot, as you can see in the pix, the Saffire I got for test is a true
blue job. So far so good for me, but I have seen other saffires of other
colours – such as red. So should red saffires be called ruby? Not really.
That is why the spelling has been changed from 'pph' to 'ff' ! That's
a good lesson in English grammar!
The Saffire that was used for this test belongs to Mr. Akbar Rajwani and
was bought and paid for at full price and came to me almost new with just
700 kms on the clock – thanks to Akbar. I was tempted to ask him, "Akbar
ki laundi Hindustan ki Malika ban sakti hai kya?" But did not ask because
he would have said, "that's what I am giving you this laundi (saffire)
for.
YOU find that out and let me know".
Those who have seen the movie "Mughal-E-Azam" (in which the late Prithviraj
Kapoor has played the role of Akbar Badshah) would appreciate what I am
saying. Those who have not seen Mughal-E-Azam, better see it first chance
you get. You have really missed something. There has been no movie like
it before or after.
I believe the Bajaj Saffire was formally launched in Pune on 1st or 2nd
April, 2000. As a genre, it should evoke the same enthu as the two-stroke
Chetak did two decades ago, when it was ALLOTTED to you by the grace of
God & government, after having paid precious foreign exchange and waited
in line for years ! It was really a bragging point – not bragging about
the scooter – but about how "smart" you were to book the scooter at the
right time, how cleverly you "arranged" foreign exchange, how you cleverly
"managed" to jump the queue through your "connections", and generally
how "well connected" you are. Those were the legendary days of socialism.
Of the "control-quota-permit-inspector" raj of designer corruption. You
never got or bought anything. Everything was "allotted" to you as a favor
done by govt. And each allotment (of whatever) was a reason for celebration
– since life itself was an "allotment". Be it allotment of a gas connection,
a milk card, a ration card or even a single cylinder, two-stroke, manual
geared, Bajaj scooter!
I did collect the Blue Saffire from Akbar along-with the 0wners Manual
(OM). The bike appeared to be in excellent condition. However the kick
starter did not work at all. It was jammed. If you "lagao-ed jor", on
the kick starter lever, the whole crank-case assembly shook as if it is
going to fall off ! The self starter was working and worked without fail
every time. Great ! So I decided to avoid the kicker because I didn't
want the engine to fall off. To see what this scooter is all about I began
with an inspection of the OM. (Here OM stands for Owner's Manual, not
Old Monk).
 The
106 mm by 140 mm page size of the OM is a lesson in economy. But the real
importance of economics did not dawn upon me till I saw the Technical
Specifications on page 2. It said "4-stroke, single cylinder forced air
cooled engine". Very good. What is the engine size? I looked under ENGINE
DISPLACEMENT : It said 74.40 cm3 or 92.25 cm3. On
the same page in Hindi it said, "engine ka visthaapan" (visthaapan means
displacement) and under it is written 74.4 cm3 aur 92.2 cm3.
Thus stoopid DilipBam who learnt ONLY Hindi at Municipal School No.4 at
Gorakhpur, discovers that the engine ka visthaapan of the Bajaj Saffire
is 74.4 cm3 AUR 92.2 cm3, which mathematically adds
up to 166.6 cm3. The only thing I am wondering about is whether
Saffire has one engine of 166.6 cm3 or two separate engines
of 74.4 cm3 AUR 92.2 cm3! One for the agla pahiya
and the other for the pichhla pahiya ? Are these these two different sized
engines available on the same bike or two different engines on different
bikes making two distinctly different models? Or is it something very
sophisticated which idiots like DilipBam cannot understand?
So "or" in English becomes "aur" in Hindi. The whole bluddy meaning changes!
I think somewhere Mr. ShakeUppa Iyer (who invented English and is known
as Shakespeare in England) is masquerading around as Vice-President (Grammar)
at this company. This is your second lesson in English Grammar. Now I
know how this company manages to sell everything so cheap. Save money
by printing a general owners manual with a lot of options – which will
cover all bikes and other models. Give a copy of it to each buyer (sucker?).
And let him one-durr for the rest of his life whether his Saffire is 74.4
cc or 92.2 cc. Seeing as BAL will sell almost 15 lakh vehicles this fiscal,
the money saved on Owners Manual alone will run into crores!
Yet fact remains that I have to do a test on this bike. So first I must
know what to expect from it. Whether it is a horse or a donkey or an elephant?
How big is it supposed to be? What is its power supposed to be? How much
torque? What will be its fuel efficiency? What kind of speed can be expected?
So how to find out?
I asked one of the RTO inspectors as to how much was the engine displacement
(visthaapan) of the Saffire?
 He
said, he wasn't sure. He didn't know. And didn't want to know such irrelevant
things. He also asked me to get out and not waste his time while he was
making money. So I looked in the RC/TC book of the Saffire. Here, in this
govt. document, on page 4, under "Detailed Description", listed at item
9 is Horse Power (B.H.P.). In Front of it, in the worst possible handwriting
is written something which looks very similar to '92 cc'. Item 10 on the
same page just below item 9, is for cubic capacity,……..which the RTO has
left blank. Does it mean that according to RTO the cubic capacity is zero?
Or does it mean that RTO does not know (or is not bothered about) the
cubic capacity of this bike?
Great ! I thought. The govt. people are even bigger geniuses than BAL
! In one stroke of the pen they have decided (defined?) that the units
for Horse Power (BHP) is cc ! All engineering colleges, Indian Standards
Institution, Issac Newton and all horses and donkeys to note that in future
the unit for measuring BHP is cc.
However, I did wonder why they wrote 92 cc in the RC/TC book of the Saffire?
And I asked one crooked looking "agent" type character drifting around
in the RTO premises. He replied, "Oh, the company engineer who was here
told us to write 92 cc as engine size, so that's what we wrote, what's
your problem?" "Don't you need documentary proof of engine size for taxation
purposes?" I asked.
"No", said the agent type character. "RTO levy tax at 7% of invoice value,
which is in Rupees, not in cc, BHP or Torque. In any case all this shit
information like cc, BHP, torque, weight etc. is for the excise duty dept.,
not for the RTO, so who cares?"
Indeed !Who cares? Why should he care? It does not concern him. Apparently
it also did not bother Akbar Rajwani. BAL must have said to him, "This
is the bike and this is the price. If you want it, pay the price and take
the bike." Which is what he did. So if Akbar Badshah is not bothered,
why should BAL be bothered? Indeed nobody seems to be bothered except
an idiot called Dilip Bam.
I asked Muddon N. Rajan. He is a manager in State Bank. A senior sarkari
officer. At least he will appreciate my logic. It is the religion of all
senior sarkari officers to be correct, exact and specific about every
subject matter, even if it does not matter, That is what Lord Mac Caulay
has specified since 1826 A.D. Muddon asked me, "Can this Saffire bike
get me to and from Office everyday safely? Can I afford its fuel consumption?
Can I take my wife for a ride?" My answer to all his questions was "YES".
So he said, "Dilip Bam you are an idiot. If this bike can do all that
I need it to do, and at a price I can afford, why bother about cc and
all that? After all. As long as the cat catches the rat, does it matter
whether it is black or white?" That is / was Muddon's point of view .
I am still not satisfied.
There is a thing called Brand Equity. When you buy a Rolls Royce, you
are not only buying the best car that money can buy, but you are also
buying a name. And anything associated with that name must be the best
in the business – which includes not only the Rolls Royce car, but also
dealer, dealer's staff, employee uniforms (if any), spare parts, workshop
facilities, work procedures and quality, tools quality, showroom, leaflets,
catalogues, and manuals – including OWNERS MANUAL! Everything that comes
under that name MUST live up (or down) to that name ! That is what Brand
Equity is all about.
Apparently, there is no concept of Brand Equity here. Cheapness is the
name of the game. The whole thing is shoddy. Third class. Take it or leave
it. We are like this only ! Sab chalta hai !
ROAD TEST :
Vehicle ……………….shayad Saffire.
Looks…………………………..visible.
Styling……………………. style hai.
Dicky………seat ke neechay kya hai?
Gadi chalta hai kya?……..Chalta hai.
Braking?…………………..Rookta hai.
Top speed?………………….Kaafi tej.
BHP…………………..Kaiyee ghoday.
Visthaapan………….jagah gherta hai
Fuel consumption…..petrol peeta hai.
Price…………………..Paisa lagta hai. |
