[Sran]

What a brilliant post outlining the history of an important car in Indian automobile saga. Esteem was a car that had some chronic ailments and the car demanded regular maintenance. Even in early 2000s one could get second hand esteem around 1.25 lakhs at least in Pune/Mumbai. Few of my college mates bought it and its cheaper alternatives were Daewoo cielo and Opel Astra. Wonderful memories of helping in buying few of them as I was the preffered car buying guy and many more non-memorable visits to various garages to fix them up.

[GTO]

Damn, that's a fun read! Many thanks for sharing, Shreyfiesta! I vividly remember the day that I saw the Maruti 1000. Was coming back from school and someone in the neighbour had bought a white one. Me & my schoolfriend drooled all over the car. It looked so darn futuristic, like a spaceship amongst the 118NEs & Contessa Classics! But the 1.0L engine was a major letdown and its reputation for poor performance + a weak AC quickly spread. Maruti took its own sweet time to bring the 1.3L, but when the Esteem 1.3L was launched, it was pretty much the fastest accelerating sedan of its time. Enthusiasts lusted after it like we do the Octavia vRS today. The Cielo & Astra had better styling, but they weren't as much fun to drive (Astra especially, was launched with a yawn-inducing slow revving engine).

My RX100 was stolen a little before and I was heartbroken. No more 2-wheels, my folks said. As if to make up, Dad bought the Esteem 1.3L. It served as our family's "luxury car" from 1996 - 2000. Then, the Lancer took over and the Esteem became the family beater from 2001 - 2007, when we sold it for the Indigo. It was a robust & reliable workhorse that took a lot of abuse. IIRC, the Esteem had clocked 200,000 km without requiring an engine rebuild.

Our Esteem was stolen from the building...we were lucky enough to get it back in a handful of weeks - related thread (My car got stolen this morning!!).

Delivery night:




Me with my then favourite:




The replacement "luxury car"

[Sidjohri]

Many thanks for the comprehensive ode to the workhorse that was Maruti Esteem. Took me down memory lane - I had a 2007 Esteem VXi and boy what a steed it was! Graciously loaded with creature comforts (by 2007 standards), peppy engine, decent ground clearance, and extremely reliable. This meant that we never shied taking her to our numerous excursions to the hills, which also included tackling rough terrains more often than not. It always stood by us and never let us down - not even a single instance that I can remember of. The car was low on maintenance and running costs - would have still been with us if not for the NGT imposed constraints. We sold it off a few years ago and got a relatively reasonable sum for it. I'm sure it is still gliding with its new owner somewhere in the country!

Note: Among other things I still remember the automatic antenna that came with the car - the original piece was still working flawlessly till it was with us!

[Malyaj]

This is such a nostalgia trip. Although we never owned one (couldn't afford it), I remember the 1000 making heads turn. We lived in Delhi at that time and used to play football in a park by the road. Some of us would stop playing every time a 1000 drove by, just to ogle at it. This says more about the boredom that had set in with the Fiats and Ambassadors.

Obviously I wasn't old enough to drive until 1996 or understand anything about automobiles except how they looked, so it baffled me why the Astras and Cielos were getting outgunned by Esteem, which had started looking a bit plain.

My last trip in an Esteem was in 2010 in the form of a badly run down cab in Delhi. I was surprised by how cramped the cabin was, because my childhood memories of it were of a big luxurious car. Few months back I found one parked next to the current generation WagonR and the latter looked like a giant in comparison.

[Aakash118]

Wow, great thread. I always loced the simple yet classy looks of Esteem in my childhood. In 2008, we went for a long journey to Vrindavan in my uncle’s esteem and I found the car to be both powerful and comfortable. Here is one ad from Nov 02 Autocar.

[diwakarmuthu]

@Shreyfiesta, thanks for a wonderful thread about Esteem. It is nostalgic for me as it was the first ever car purchase for me, a pre owned white Esteem that was company maintained and had done very little mileage.

The car was no nonsense performer. Pretty good mileage and more importantly super reliable. As it was approaching its 11th or 12th year, it started to give problems with the AC and Steering columns. The AC was pretty expensive to fix as the model of AC wasn't available. I ended up picking up the next gen Esteem AC compressor and parts to run it for a further 2 years.

The engine at 80k at the time of selling was still in pristine condition. Felt sad to see it go.

I had dreams of souping it up and doing some rounds on the tracks, but lack of space and time made me take the tough decision to sell it.

Unfortunately, I don't have any photographs of myself with the car. Wish, I had taken a few before I let it go!

[rpunwani]

GTO, what a coincidence. I too had an Esteem VX from 1996 to 2002, which I sold and upgraded to a Lancer from 2002-2018. Was sad to see the Esteem go; had wonderful memories and many road trips in the car. The Esteem was very reliable - did not have a single breakdown in the 6 years of ownership. Just regular servicing

[kamilharis]

Big thanks for this amazing write-up, wow!

One of the cars which I used to drool when I was small, along with the Lancer, Honda City & Baleno. Somewhere in the future, I would definitely try my best to own one of this beauty.

[PrideRed]

Esteem was a good car and Maruti did address shortcomings of Maruti 1000 quite well. That said the stock car had lousy suspension, super soft and with 4 people on board would bottom out at every road hump. The 1.3L mill was fun though it was only 65HP . One of the unique design elements which I think was way ahead of time was side AC vents, which were on door and not on dash.

[cochinist]

MS 1000 was my first love.
But kindly requesting not to name it as a Lemon.
It never was a lemon, a true work horse and a Rally Stage Specialist.

[jkrishnakj]

What a lovely reminiscing post on the Esteem. When the toss up came between the Ford Ikon or Accent Viva or the Esteem, I went and got a pearl white VX petrol Esteem in 2003. Had taken me to many places and got us back home as well each time. I don’t recall all spending too much on service either. I have to search the archives for the pictures.

Esteem is what introduced my family to long drives.

[RGK]

A fitting homage to the Maruti 1000/Esteem.

With regard to the car, these are the things that I found admirable.

• The engine was very quiet.
• At the time, the car's tail was very stylish.
• Good suspension and better ride quality.
• The dashboard and instrument cluster were quite sturdy and made no rattle noises when compared to other Maruti vehicles at the time.

The only drawback was how challenging it was for tall people like me to get in and out of the car.

[KI07]

We had the type-I and type-II Esteems, I loved the type-2, felt amazing and superior, seating in it was so low it felt as if I was just a few centimeters above the ground,
I don't think I've sat in a car lower than that.

[Maky]

Thank you for creating this thread on the Legendary Esteem.

My late father had bought three, one for each of the brothers, in the 90s. I still remember being driven somewhere with my mom when our driver told me we were getting a new car and the old Maruti Van(omni) would go away I was so angry, I had grown very attached to our Van as it was the only car I knew from childhood : )
I was angrier still as my cousin brother who was visiting from america during his summer holidays got to pick up the car instead of me while I was in school. Everything went away when I sat in our maroon Esteem for the first time, a cup holder coming out of the dashboard!, an AC that actually chilled along with the cool connecting duct for side vents, a dashboard which was super soft to touch, the doors had cloth fabric finish(they still dont do that !), lights in the dickie when you'd open it, a comparitively quiet cabin, so many lights with a then modern squared design in the dashboard no rpm meter ofcourse... plenty dummy buttons where we'd go on to add multiple illegal horns. An extremely impressive package for the time. When we bought it I think it was available in just the one trim, a neighbour got his later with fancy power windows and made sure to show it off to me heh.
I am proud to say we used the Esteem for 17 years. I would have liked to keep it for even longer but times change.

I had long hoped Maruti would bring back the Esteem nameplate with a very luxury next-gen sedan but then the sedans started falling out of favour with the general public in favour of SUVs. The recent VAG group launches seem to have put some life back into the sedan segment and I have become hopeful once again : )

[ritedhawan]

Nice read. It seemed like a trip down the memory lane. The 95 Esteem has a special place in my heart as it was the car that I learned to drive in the year 2005. My father bought the Type one Esteem in 1995 ; me and my other two siblings loved the back seat opulence of this car. We had an '84 red Maruti 800 as well. Since, the day the car was bought, from that moment onwards my father primary drive became the Esteem. The M800 became the secondary vehicle. Rarely did my father used the M800 from the day Esteem was bought.

My father insisted that my mother should learn to drive and then M800 was used by my mother and later by my two siblings who learned to drive. However, I was the only one who learned to drive on Esteem as it was 10 years old and we had already sold M800 at the end of 1999.

We had fond memories of Esteem. In the year 2003, my father upgraded to a second hand Opel Astra which became his primary drive. I used to watch my twin siblings fight for the opportunity to drive Esteem.

One fine day my sister took the car to a local market, came back after sometime to realize that the car was gone! She called my brother, mother and it took some time to realize that the car was lost. It was sheer luck that our preferred mechanic spotted our car not far from the place where it was stolen. He got in touch with my brother and without further ado my brother reached the place to procure the vehicle. It was thanks to our preferred mechanic that we got the car without my father knowing about the same. It seems M1000 and Esteem were easy for thieves to steal. My mother's brother had a M1000 which got lost and another cousin who had an esteem gone to the thieves!

We were at our Nani's place and together with our cousins decided to watch 'Khosla Ka Ghosla' and we packed yourself in our beloved Esteem. It took more weight than it could afford too, and my brother risked it. I was not part of the group as I had decided to follow in a scooter. Prior to approaching the Cinema hall parking , there was a speed breaker, the overloaded esteem front surmounted it but at the same time the front axle gave up! It was funny and embarrassing at the same time, as I was following it. My brother took the onus of getting the car dispatched to our preferred mechanic location.

My brother had a flamboyant style of driving before he sobered up and Esteem bore the brunt of that flamboyance. He met with an accident , the front of car took the hit and came close to the firewall and the engine popped up! Thankfully my brother escaped without injury. The car at that point could have been dispensed off as total loss however my father decided otherwise and the car was handed over to our preferred mechanic who did his best to bring it back to shape. However, it lived with a deformity from that point onwards: The rear used to drift on its own after 80 km\hr+ speed!

Everyone in our family had their hands on the Esteem then finally in 2005 I decided to learn to drive and this became my vehicle. I still remember, how difficult it was for me to learn the clutch-throttle modulation in a carburetor Esteem, coming to terms with all wheel drum type braking, and more importantly to surmount the deformity of the car. Once I had surpassed the 'Learner's' learning curve; was able to surmount the deformity of the car and was abreast with the 'nitty gritty' of our beloved esteem: The culmination of which was a permanent license. I took it to the Himalayas and loved every bit of it. Later during a routine inspection of the car by MASS it was identified that coolant and engine oil was getting mixed and the head gasket was the culprit. It was fixed by MASS.

The end of the first decade of the millennium marked the time to bid goodbye to our beloved White 95 Esteem. Everyone in our family had their own sweet memories of our beloved Esteem. I still remember standing in the balcony and watching my father handing over the keys of our Beloved Esteem to the next owner and it became difficult for me to suppress my emotions as I was the last one who came in love with that car: Couldn't suppress a tear in my eyes!