Ashok LeylandAshok Motors was established in 1948 at Ennore near Channai in India. It started its business by assembling Austin cars. In 1950, it started to license build Leyland commercial vehicles. With the participation of Leyland Motors in 1954, it was renamed Ashok Leyland. In 1963, Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Commision bought two double-deck articulated Comet buses with 12m long bodywork by Hyderabad Allwyn Metal Works Ltd (H50/30R). They were the first full height articulated double-deckers in the world. Ashok Leyland commenced the production of Titan in 1968, just as the production of the type ceased in Britain. The type has been improved, strengthened and it is now still in production. The reputations of Ashok Leyland are undoubtedly reliability and ruggedness. It is a miracle that an overloaded bus with two times its design capacity can attain good reliability even if it has to serve badly paved roads as steep as 1:3 in gradient. "In passenger transportation, the jump is equally dramatic: from 25% to 80%. At 60 million passengers a day, Ashok Leyland buses carry more people than the entire Indian rail network. In the populous Indian metros, four out of the five State Transport Undertakings (STUs) buses come from Ashok Leyland. Some of them like double decker and vestibuled buses are unique models from Ashok Leyland, tailor-made for high density routes." As quoted from Ashok Leyland Homepage, the company takes the lion's share in road transportation in India. Ashok Leyland Cheetah (India) Ashok Leyland Lynx (India) Ashok Leyland Stag (India) Ashok Leyland Titan (Bangladesh, India) Ashok Leyland Viking (India, United Arab Emirates) Ashok Leyland RE SLF BS4 (India) Ashok Leyland ULE CNG BS4 (India) Return to Anthony's Bus Homepage Page created: 10 November 2002 Last updated: 29 July 2012 |