MANI NAGAPPA, PRESIDENT, VINTAGE AND CLASSIC VEHICLES FOUNDATION OF INDIA (VCVF) ON HIS HOBBY AND VCVF

Mani Nagappa, noted sculptor and car enthusiast in the city, shares with us his craze for automobiles and speaks about the Vintage and Classic Vehicles Foundation of India (VCVF). Time flew past and we were enthralled as Mani Nagappa narrated his adventures or shall we say his misadventures and many other interesting stories. He had us in splits with his inimitable humour and wit.

From my childhood I was interested in engines, locomotives and shapes.  Being a sculptor I developed a particular affinity to the cars of my time, which had beautiful shapes.

(laughing...)  Oh! that was a quite an experience... I assembled a car in 1947.  I bought an old Goventry Primaya motor and fitted in a Austin gearbox and made a three-wheeler by looking at a design in an Italian Automobile magazine.  It was like our auto-rickshaw minus the body.  I had it running at 20 miles per hour.  It was a single cylinder engine.  I used to take trials on Sundays from my house to a park nearby.  It was a distance of about 500 yards from my house.  There always used to be five or six fellows running behind 'my car'. 

Way back in those days, police sergeants used to come by bicycle or by horse.  And they were mostly Anglo-Indians.  One Sunday, as usual I took my car and started out when a sergeant named Hunt happened to come by on his bicycle and he stopped me.  And there I was, a puny 18-year-old shivering with fright.  As I turned in sheer fright for some moral support from my loyal followers, none of them were in sight.  He asked me where I had got this junk (my car).  I falteringly said that I had constructed it.  He looked at me strangely and asked for my age.  I replied that I was 18.  Then in a stern voice he said that this 'junk' had no number plate, no lights and that I was not supposed to drive until I was 22 and that he could prosecute me.  By then the news had reached my house and my brothers came running.  Then the sergeant asked for my name and when he came to know about my father who was quite well known, he sat beside me in 'my car' and asked me to drive him to my house.

He cooled down over a bottle of beer and as he sat talking with my father at our house, he said that he was also interested in engines and locomotives.  He asked me to make use of the grounds at the Government House in the future, whenever I wanted to have trials of 'my car'. 

There started a wonderful friendship.  We even started planning to build an aeroplane with a Douglas engine, which had 5,000 revolutions per minute.  But my parents put a stop to all this, as they feared for my safety.  After that I entered the cinema field.  In those days, I was simply crazy about sports cars and I would just go buy them.  I would not go in for durability but was more interested in shapes.  Collecting cars became my hobby.  Today I have got 12 cars.

Four of us joined together and started this club.  We had 20 cars, we held a rally and we got a very good response.  Shankar Dev, Ram Viswanath, Palanivelu and myself just sat and decided that we would have a club. 

Life membership is just Rs 1,000/-.  Two or three times in a year we have get togethers and picnics.  As we have a lot of old cars, we have our own engineer and mechanics and even parts for these old cars can be obtained through us from foundations abroad or through other clubs with which we are associated.

The objectives of VCVF apart from sports and recreation are Social and Scientific.  For example, a NGO wanted sponsorship for handicapped people, we did a rally and the cars were exhibited for the general public. The proceeds that are raised are given to the NGO.  Even Engineering colleges ask us to exhibit the cars to their students.

Now we have amalgamated with Bangalore, so when they have a rally we take our cars and go. Similarly when we have rallies they exhibit their cars.  The Sri Lankan Vintage Vehicle Foundation was started after a few Sri Lankan friends saw my collection and wanted to start something similar to VCVF; we helped them start the foundation.  We try to exhibit our club member's cars for their rallies and vice versa.  We have even given them a trophy from our club, to be awarded to the best car every year.  That was how the tie-up came about.  We can even arrange for Ducati, Ferrari, Rolls Royce and such other cars to be exhibited here in Chennai.

It is not that expensive, but unless one has some back up or support it can be a little difficult.  For members of our club, getting a few parts that are not available here is quite easy, as the club can arrange for these things through its contacts. 

It's both this way and that.  While some people wax eloquent and say that we should be proud to own such lovely creations, others deride us saying we are wasting time and money with junk.  When we have rallies, we have people both admiring our cars as well as people who make fun calling them 'dubba vandies' (broken down cars).

Cars from 1908 till 1940, we classify as vintage.  Cars between 1940 and 1960 are called classics.  From 1960 to 1980, we have pre-classics and then there are special or peculiar cars. 

In Tamil Nadu, more than 500 vintage cars are there.  Of these only about 100 will be in a running condition.  Our club has 170 members, but only 50 of them have a vintage or classic car.  The members find it difficult to maintain it and on top of that they have to pay tax for the car, when they hardly take it to the road once or twice in a year for rallies and other club events.  The government will have to remove the tax as otherwise the cars will slowly be bought off by foreign collectors or even collectors from other parts of India.  I am willing to do anything so that these cars remain in Tamil Nadu and in India.  If the government is willing to start a museum, I am even willing to donate all my 12 cars.   

We have two regular rallies every year.  One is usually held before Christmas towards the end of the year.  The other depends on the season.  The rallies are organised based on the sponsorship available and we are very much dependent on sponsorships, since it is quite expensive to run these cars.

I, as an artist, a sculptor am attracted to a car by its shape and not so much by its make.  Apart from the normal cars, what I like is cars with curves that set them apart.  I buy them in any condition and bring them to the original condition.  I buy the car for a song and since I have a group of mechanics to bring them back to their original condition, it is just child's play for me.  About my collection; My 1931 Skoda, which I inherited from my family, 1940 Triumph Model, 1925 Moris Cowley magneto model, 1925 Austin Chevy again a magneto model, 1960 Mazda model, 1960 Mrs Smith (a German car) and a 1992 Toyota Sera.  These seven cars are the running cars in my collection.

The other cars in my collection are in semi running condition and need to be renovated.  T- Model 2, has to be repaired and so also the Triumph Roadster, which is one of my favourites. 

It's been quite an interesting love affair with the Skoda, which is my favourite car.  An interesting thing that my wife shared with me after our marriage is that, she fell in love with the car (Skoda) first and then with me.  I had inherited it from my family and I had it with me till 1956.  I had to go to Sri Lanka then, and since one of my friends was pestering me for it.  I gave it to him for Rs 4,000/-.  The Nawab of Hyderabad bought it from him and then the tracks were lost.  I found all this out when I returned from Ceylon.  I spotted the car again in a very dilapidated condition with a man.  I bought it again for Rs 1,50,000/- from him after I got all the necessary papers signed from him,as I did not want to take a chance.  But I couldn't get the registration papers from him as he had pledged it to a company, which had closed down.  I then had to pay a fine and spent another 50,000 rupees on restoring the car.

One particular day as I was taking the Skoda, I stopped at a shop near the Czechoslovakian agency to buy something.  When I came out, there was a big man with a Benz who was admiring the car.  He turned to me and asked, 'Are you the proud owner of this car?'I replied in the affirmative.  Then he told me that this was his car, as it was from his country and since they did not have even one left in his country, he would like to buy it.  I refused, even when he offered me a brand new sports car in lieu of it.  After that he offered to source for me any part in case I had difficulty in finding spares and took leave asking me to take good care of this beauty.

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