New Delhi to host 7th Overdrive Awards on 13 January

MUMBAI: The seventh edition of Infomedia India‘s annual Overdrive Awards will be held on 13 January 2006 in New Delhi‘s Pragati Maidan.

Held in association with the three leading industrial bodies – the Automotive Component Manufacturers Association (ACMA), the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), the award will put into limelight the cars, bikes, products and personalities that have shaped the course of the automotive industry in the past year.

The short listed contenders for the four premier awards, the Car of the year, Utility Vehicle of the Year, Bike of the Year and Scooter of Year will be assembled at the Overdrive base in Pune for the judges to evaluate and judge, and will run the course of the week to give all the judges sufficient time to evaluate each and every contender and judge on relative merits and also vis-a vis the industry standard, states an official release.

The judging process has been modeled on international norms and standards, established by the ‘European Car of the Year‘ awards. The process consists of a briefing, where all the judges are provided information on all the nominated vehicles. The vehicles then are made available to the jury to drive and score. Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Pvt Ltd will finally validate the judging process, the release adds.

The panel of judges will comprise of people like Karun Chandok-current A1 Grand Prix ace, Leela Krishnan- 7 times National Rally Champion, Vikram Mathais-National Rally Champion 2004 apart from the Overdrive editorial team and prominent personalities from leading industry bodies.

The same short listing criteria apply for the other categories. The bikes that qualify for the award are Bajaj Avenger, Bajaj Discover 112, LML CRD 100, Hero Honda Achiever, Hero Honda Super Splendor / Glamour, TVS Apache, TVS Star City.

The shortlist for the scooters includes Bajaj Wave DTS-I, Kinetic 4S, TVS Scooty PEP+.

The short list for the utility vehicles includes Honda CR-V 2.4. Hyundai Tuscon, Mahindra Scorpio CRDe, Tata Safari Dicor, Toyota Innova.