Motorsport in India is on a gradual rise; people have slowly started to take interest in the same and the number of people wanting to take part is slowly increasing.
In order to make India a superpower in the racing world, more people will have to be attracted to the sport, in terms of both competing and cheering on. With more racers in the country, the chances of Indian drivers succeeding become high and if there is a big audience to watch the sport, more money can be chipped in by the sponsors to help the drivers rise up the ranks and make the country proud.
Ideally, the first step to execute this would be spreading the word about Motorsport and this year at the National Auto Expo in Delhi, the FMSCI, which is the governing body of Motorsport in India did exactly that.
A Tour of FMSCI Pavilion (Federation of Motor Sports Clubs of India)
Along with JK Tyres, they set up a big pavilion at the Auto Expo with a lot of racecars, bikes and karts to catch the eye of the crowd. The exhibits included a rally car, a drift car, a couple of formula cars, including the JK Tyres LGB Formula Four prototype, a National Rotax Series kart as well as an IndiKarting National Series kart and also a big fleet of Indian racebikes from manufacturers such as Yamaha, Suzuki, Honda and TVS.
The exhibits did their job very well and they were able to attract a lot of people to the pavillion, thus helping in achieving their goal of educating the Indian audience about Motorsports. They also had big informational displays about the different forms of Motorsport such as rallying, karting, single seater racing, bike racing, supercross etc and the entire schedule of motorsport events in India for 2018 was displayed.
Champion’s Trophy – Gaurav Gill – APRC 2017
There was a lot for the proper enthusiast too; a big memorabilia section was set up with racing suits, helmets and trophies of iconic Indian drivers and riders such as Gaurav Gill, Karun Chandhok, CS Santosh, Armaan Ebrahim and Aditya Patel being displayed and this put a big smile on my face.
CS Santosh’s Racing Suit – Dakar Rally 2018
Karun Chandok’s Racing Suit Hispania Racing Formula 1 Team
Karun Chandok’s Racing Suit – 24 Hours of Le Mans
Armaan Ebrahim’s Racing Suit Super Trofeo Asia 2016
A few drivers such as Gaurav Gill and Armaan Ebrahim also made the trip to Delhi to tell the audience more about racing and to attract them to compete or at least start watching the sport. On the 12th of February, they set up an event at the pavillion which celebrated women in Motorsport with some of the most successful women in Indian motorsport being a part of the programme.
At the pavillion, I was lucky enough to converse with the Secretary General of the FMSCI, Mr Rajan Syal and here is a clip of my interview with him.
Apart from the big crowd that visited the pavilion, former FIA President Max Mosley also decided to take some time out to have a look at what the FMSCI had set up and he seemed to be really impressed.
It was a pleasant surprise to see the governing body of Indian Motorsport making efforts to engage people to this enticing sport and this is a positive step towards the growth of competitive racing in India.
In my opinion, more of such promotional campaigns must be set up to spread the word about racing and eventually make it reach new heights in India.
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