Category Archives: Motorsport

Travels with the Husky

Published January 13, 2023 / by Jehangir

The unique geography of the Kashmir Valley – less than 200 kilometres from end to end and less than 40 kilometers across at its widest point – means that an early start enables day trips to almost any part of the valley.

Over most weekends my family likes to indulge in our shared passion for travel and birding, facilitated by the synchronicity between three factors:
The first is the amazing network of roads being built across the valley under PMGSY, MNREGA and similar schemes.
The second is the awesomeness of Google Maps – enabling us to point at any spot on the map and venture forth secure in the knowledge that the app will find us a route to that destination.
The third and most-vital factor is that the quality of the road ceases to be a limiting factor because of the extreme capabilities of Jamshed’s newly-acquired off-roader.

More suited to the physical capacity of my generation, overlanding – with off-roading whenever unavoidable – has become our family-friendly travel style (a fact conceded painfully by my body after a few harrowing drives in the Gypsy King). I remember a time when the transition from the Willys Jeep to the original Gypsy felt like unparalleled luxury. How times change!

More than 30 years separate the two Gypsy photographs

We have set ourselves 3 quests:
1. To visit every place of historical or archaeological interest in the valley
2. To visit every river valley of Kashmir
3. To photograph our fast vanishing wildlife – especially every bird species found in Kashmir.
Bonus : Improptu picnics, amazing landscapes, river confluences, and similar interesting sights along the way.

Jamshed had been searching for a true-blue off-roader while waiting for the Suzuki Jimny (which is yet to hit roads in India even though it has been built in the country since 2019. Go figure!) The basic checklist included a four-wheel drive off-roader with low range gearbox, independent supension, relative comfort and easy service.

Soft-roaders did not enter our thought process at all. Think MMA versus WWE. Khabib Nurmagomedov versus The Rock. Soft-roaders are little imitation off-roaders with increased ground clearance, bumped-out wheel arches and bigger tyres but have high gear ratios and a single-speed transfer case. The All-Wheel-Drive (AWD) system is more of a road safety feature than an adventure accessory.

Soft-roaders are just a clever marketing concept as the manufacturers know that these ‘crossovers‘ are more likely to be seen in the company of expensive dog-breeds outside city cafes (like Little Hut or whatever it is called these days) than on rocky mountain tracks.

True 4WD off-roaders can shift the transfer case into a low gear ratio (4-Lo) when the terrain is too tough for four-wheel drive alone. Low transmission and low transfer-case gear ratios multiply engine torque to insane levels. Just put a Gypsy King into 4-Lo and watch it transmogrify from the mild-mannered Dr. Bruce Banner into the Incredible Hulk. Yup – its that dramatic.

I am a petrol-head who has never owned a diesel car but the petrol four-wheel drive options currently available in the country are too expensive to justify purchase for the sake of occasional off-roading. The three-door Mahindra Thar was dismissed as a family-unfriendly wannabe Jeep Wrangler (plus the viral video of a Thar sliding off the mountainside at the Zig killed off any argument in its favor).

Finally, we settled on a pre-owned Mitsubishi Pajero based upon the monster winter performance of Javid Bakshi‘s bulldog Pajero. I was not too happy with the diesel versus petrol (and spares/service) compromise but what to do?

Out of the blue Jamshed was offered an exquisitely well-maintained Suzuki Grand Vitara and jumped at the chance. The petrol-only Grand Vitara is a full-time 4WD off-roader with legendary Suzuki build quality. It had been imported fully built-up from Japan and ticked all the required boxes plus quite a few more – a timeless design, an excellent driving position, Suzuki reliability and ease-of-service and, most importantly, sedan-like comfort on highways.

Off-road enthusiasts like to christen their vehicles and ‘Husky‘ is the name bestowed upon Jamshed’s new ride complete with a bobble-head mascot.

Over the past year the Husky has traversed diverse terrain ranging from the muddy depths of the Wular floodplains to the highest motororable end-points in Ladakh. These trips will feature in a new section of this blog in the future. Enjoy!

Composite GPS Track of the Husky’s wanderings

Motorsport in Kashmir II

Published December 8, 2018 / by Jehangir

Half a century after the adventures of the 1931 Citroën-Haardt Trans-Asiatic Expedition, Motor Rallying proper was introduced to Kashmir in the 1980’s when JK Tourism and Maruti-Suzuki jointly sponsored a local team for the 1st Great Desert Himalaya Raid.

I attended the trials conducted by Rajeev Khanna on the track leading to the top of the Kral Sangri hillock. Rajeev Khanna (grandson of the founder of the Oberoi Group and one of the most famous rallyists in India) had been selected as Team Leader for the event. The track was rarely used and had been declared out-of-bounds for traffic that day. Rajeev and I were on timekeeping duty at the top of the hill when my brother Javid Bakshi started his trial run from the base of the hill. From our vantage point we could see a truck stray on to the road from some side trail on course for a head-on collision with his car.

Rajeev jumped into the driver’s seat of my car and for some reason I clambered into the passenger seat. ‘Seat belt please‘ is the last thing I remember hearing. The rest was a visual blur. A wheel-spinning turn, smothering dust-clouds, the smell of burning rubber, and the screaming agony of an engine being tortured beyond its endurance are etched into my memory. Somehow we managed to stop the truck off the racing line. My brother qualified for the JK Tourism team but my fleeting drive as a passenger had convinced me that while I could drive fast cars competently enough, motor rallying required a much higher level of skill and courage.

The JK Tourism team performed very creditably that year, claiming 3rd National and 5th position overall driving a stock Maruti Suzuki Gypsy against highly-fancied opposition in the Great Desert Himalaya Raid. The rally had been flagged off on August 28, 1988 in New Delhi and concluded at Cheshma Shahi after covering 5,000 gruelling kilometers over 10 legs passing through Jaipur, Bikaner, Jaislamer, Jodhpur, Dehradun, Shimla, Manali, Sarchu,and Leh. Next year the team again secured 3rd National and 5th position overall in the 1989 International Great Desert Himalayan Raid.

1988 was the first time that rally cars with their racing livery and free-flow exhausts had torn up Kashmir’s roads and they caused quite a stir. The irrepressible Zahid Khan, the navigator of the JK Tourism Team, used to drive around town in his Gypsy with a huge sticker that read RALLY DRIVERS DO IT SIDEWAYS. Irfan Ahmed, who drove the JK Tourism Gypsy, is the fastest driver I know personally. I was the only one crazy enough to ride pillion with him during our glory days – riding the monster Yamaha RD 350 at speeds I do not believe can have been matched on regular public roads anywhere in India.

I don’t remember how Rajeev Khanna fared with his famous Opel Manta.

Incidentally the first time I saw Rajeev (or didn’t actually) was when a red streak whooshed by at warp speed at a red-light crossing one late night in Delhi. The unforgettable whine of that finely-tuned Kawasaki Ninja engine got me addicted to MotoGP. A few years back my kids dragged me halfway around Delhi just to see Valentino Rossi‘s bike. Sometimes we fantasize about a F1/MotoGP track in Kashmir. ‘The Doctor‘ thrashing a ‘46‘ monster round Gulmarg would really be an experience to remember.

Javid also owned the first true-blue dirt bike in Kashmir – a Yamaha 175. That bike blazed a glorious trail from inacessible peaks in the Pir Panjal to the desert wildernesses of Ladakh. In winter we would do the Chinese Downhill – illegal night runs in pitch darkness down the frozen Poma lift tracks of the Highland and 185 slopes in Gulmarg – on skis (nah too easy), on ‘borrowed’ sleds (one biggish bump and you are history), and finally kamikaze runs on that never-say die Yamaha.
Motorcycling Nirvana!

Imagine achieving these adventures after years of dull Jawas and Yezdis when the height of motorcycling excitement was fixing the YEZDI decal upside down so that it read IPZAH (Yup, that dull).

The 10th International Himalayan Car Rally was the last rally held in Kashmir in 1989 before the outbreak of violence in the early 1990s. In recent years motor rallying returned to the valley with the Raid-de-Himalaya Rally and the Mughal Rally.

In 2018 Abrar bin Ayub riding a Hero Impulse won the Alpine category of Xtreme Moto at the Raid de Himalaya marking the first time that a Kashmiri has won an Xtreme category at a major rally.

The local scene is nowadays quite established with regular tarmac, mud and snow events being held by off-road adventure and motor-sport outfits like Kashmir Off-Road. I only hope they prioritise ecological sensitivity while planning their events.

Motorsport in Kashmir – I

Published February 20, 2011 / by Jehangir

The Jhelum Valley Cart Road from Kohala to Baramulla, described at the time as 'the most wonderful mountain road in the world', was completed in 1889 and was extended to Srinagar in 1897.

Prior to the advent of the automobile in Kashmir, circa 1915, travellers to Kashmir made the journey in a two-horse four-seater tonga or a single-horse two-seater ekka.

In 1922, public transport was allowed on the Banihal Cart Road, which connected Srinagar with Jammu.

Traffic across the Banihal Cart Road

It was the Maharaja's of Kashmir (surprise, surprise) who owned the first cars in the Valley. During the 1920's Maharaja Hari Singh put together a collection of custom-made Rolls-Royce cars including a 1925 Barker Tourer, 1927 Windovers Limousine and a 1929 Thrupp & Maberly Tourer.

In the late 1920s, the Northern Motor Company, headquartered in Rawalpindi, started selling small four-cylinder Chevrolet tourers from a showroom in the Ganda Singh Building in Lal Chowk.

Chevrolet Tourer on the Jhelum Valley Cart Road

From an endurance point of view the greatest motor adventure of the Pre-war era was the 1931 Citroën-Haardt Trans-Asiatic Expedition. The achievement of crossing the Himalayas between Srinagar and Gilgit over a pony track across the Burzil Pass (13775 ft) will probably never be surpassed.

Georges-Marie Haardt and his team set out for China from Srinagar on the 12th of July 1931 in specially designed Citroën Kegresse half-tracks. This expedition marked the first motorised crossing of the Greater Himalaya range.