Verdict on the first Nano test drive

Now a follow-up to Monday's story "World's cheapest car hits market", via the BBC: Hormazd Sorabjee, editor of Autocar India magazine became one of the first journalists to actually drive a Tata Nano. His verdict? It's a surprisingly good car.

Sorabjee had the chance to drive the Nano not on a test track, but on actual roads. He said that the car was solid, well put-together and provided a relatively smooth ride even on rough roads - the Nano's tiny size and small wheel-base made it especially agile in tense city traffic. Given the Nano's two-cylinder 33-horsepower engine and top speed of roughly 60mph though, its probably best to keep it in the city and not venture out onto the highway.

Sorabjee said that overall the Nano was a good car that feels more expensive than its $2,000 sticker price. More than that, he praised it as a car designed to meet the specific needs of the Indian consumer, a concept of a car, he argued, that a foreign-maker would not have been able to develop.