The Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) is a 50-year-old leading automotive research institute. Headquartered in Pune, the Association renders yeomen service to vehicle manufacturers in the country. Since Chennai, popularly known as the Detroit of India, is home for several automobile manufacturers, from two-wheelers to CVs, ARAI has recently signed an MoU with the Global Automotive Research Centre (GARC) established by NATRIP at Oragadam near the city. The MoU was signed by Mrs. Rashmi Urdhwareshe, Director-ARAI, and Mr. Dinesh Vasishta, Sr. Administrative Officer, NATRIP Implementation Society. The function also witnessed a good participation from representatives from leading OEMs and OEs.
In his welcome address, Mr. M.V. Ramachandran, who is heading the GARC’s operations in Oragadam, said it is a red-letter day for the Indian automotive industry due to the signing of MoU between ARAI and NATRIP which can offer immense benefit to the local auto majors.
In an exclusive interview to MOTORINDIA, Mrs. Rashmi Urdhwareshe said that, with the signing of the MoU, the OEM and OE companies located in the South can save precious time and the logistics cost and avail the quick testing facilities provided by NATRIP’s GARC centre in Chennai. Till now vehicle and component manufacturers from the South had their products tested by sending them to ARAI, Pune, which was time consuming. It also faced shortage of time in testing vehicles coming from all over India. Now extension of services partly to NATRIP will give a great relief for the mother association.
Set up with modern facilities, GARC provides customers world class testing facilities and services with the support of well-trained engineers. For instance, GARC Chennai has modern testing facilities like photometric laboratory, pedestrian safety lab, and air bag deployment facilities. She said that, for the OEMs and OEs based out of North India, ARAI has tied up with ICAT for delivering top-class R&D services.
Answering a query from MOTORINDIA, she said since India is lagging far behind in respect of road transport regulations, ARAI has become a nodal centre for the Government’s various key and new initiatives taken for overall safety. For instance, the Government’s recent decision of making crash test facility for passenger car production mandatory was taken at the suggestion of ARAI.
Similarly, ARAI is also supporting the Government in introducing more regulations not only in the automotive sector but in the construction equipment industry for compliance to well-regulated emission norms. ARAI’s overall interest lies in road safety, Mrs. Rashmi Hemant Urdhwareshe added.
A B.E. (Electrical) from the Vishweshwaraya Regional College of Engineering, Nagpur in 1981, Mrs. Rashmi Hemant Urdhwareshe has rich experience in ARAI and has handled various senior technical and management responsibilities to cover the entire gamut of automotive electronics, instrumentation & controls, quality management, homologation & standardization, international harmonization of automotive regulations, vehicle type approval certification, export homologation and laboratory accreditation.