Missing in Action

A clutch of top brands in both two- and four-wheelers has opted out of Auto Expo 2023. But that may have more to do with Covid-19 of 2022 than any defining trend

- ARNAB DUTTA

IF YOU ARE an automobile enthusiast, and love to drool over glitzy new car models and future technologies, then your wait is finally over. After a delay of about a year, the country’s flagship automobile event—Auto Expo 2023—is back in town. Starting January 13, the latest edition of the expo is expected to host dozens of launches, as celebrity brand ambassadors glitter exhibition halls amid a frenzy of car lovers and industry stalwarts. Spread over six days, the event this time is being organised after three years, instead of two years, as the third Covid-19 wave in 2022 forced organisers to postpone the flagship show, leaving many disappointed.

Organisers, however, are ever more enthusiastic about the Auto Expo 2023 that will be held in two venues across the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR). While the auto components galleries will be hosted at the original venue of Pragati Maidan complex in Delhi, the passenger four-wheelers and two-wheelers, along with commercial vehicles, would be lined up at the India Expo Centre & Mart in Greater Noida. And to lure the fence-sitters, manufacturers are expected to fly down a host of crowd-pullers like Bollywood superstars Shah Rukh Khan, Ranveer Singh and Varun Dhawan, among others. Conceptualised in 1985, the expo made its debut a year later in Pragati Maidan and, by 2006, had begun to host new launches.