This afternoon, I'M hopping the bird to Mumbai for my "India on Two Wheels" exhibition at the Trident hotel for TDI Fashion Week--starting February 6. It's a great opportunity to leverage my images to help encourage sustainable health and transportation initiatives in India. After the show, I'll stick around for the UCI's 1.1 Tour of Mumbai, where teams RadioShack and Liquigas have just signed up for the start list.
Here's the press bit for the exhibition:
Gregg Bleakney's "India on Two Wheels" project was initially conceived on assignment at the 2010 Tour of Mumbai for VeloNews Magazine. During the pre-race Cyclothon, he met some of the city's Dabba Wallah delivery cyclists and became fascinated by the country's cycling culture. After the race, he postponed his return flight home, rented a bicycle and mini-van, and self-funded a two-month photo-tour around India--making over 16,000 portraits of cyclists. Gregg considers India's 300 million "common man" cyclists a cultural treasure at risk of extinction because of the emergence of a new class of inexpensive motorcycles. By partnering with the Tour of Mumbai and ID Sports for this exhibition, he hopes to help preserve and share this fascinating bike culture while encouraging future bicycle transportation, health, and sport initiatives in India.
A web-preview of the show.
*New* India On Two Wheels - Mumbai Exhibition - Images by Gregg Bleakney
Gregg Bleakney's "India on Two Wheels" project was initially conceived on assignment at the 2010 Tour of Mumbai for VeloNews Magazine. During the pre-race Cyclothon, he met some of the city's Dabba Wallah delivery cyclists and became fascinated by the country's cycling culture. After the race, he postponed his return flight home, rented a bicycle and mini-van, and self-funded a two-month photo-tour around India--making over 16,000 portraits of cyclists. Gregg considers India's 300 million "common man" cyclists a cultural treasure at risk of extinction because of the emergence of a new class of inexpensive motorcycles. By partnering with the Tour of Mumbai and ID Sports for this exhibition, he hopes to help preserve and share this fascinating bike culture while encouraging future bicycle transportation, health, and sport initiatives in India.
A web-preview of the show.
*New* India On Two Wheels - Mumbai Exhibition - Images by Gregg Bleakney
you obviously havent travelled south of Mumbai, if you're saying cyclists are ''at risk of extinction because of a new class of inexpensive motorcycles". How is Rs. 30,000 upto Rs. 75,000 considered 'inexpensive' for the average Indian earning on daily wages of less than Rs.30 a day?
ReplyDeleteHi Esdoss - I agree that there are regional variations on bicycle use in India. However, if we look at the entire country, moto-use/sales is growing fast. Hero, which used to be the world's largest bicycle company recently partnered with Honda to focus their energy on building inexpensive motos. In 2008, they were the first moto in history to sell over 1 million units and growth has continued. These new motos are being purchased by mid-income Indians. The market has matured to the point where mid-income consumers are selling their old motos to lower income Indians (after upgrading). Some low income earners are creatively pooling funds/saving and are beginning to close the income/purchase gap with the emergence of this second hand market.
ReplyDeleteYes, to many average Indians, the moto is still a long way off--but ask any cycling Indian boy in rural India--most will tell you that they dream of trading up to a moto. If we look at moto-sales in India, it seems as though the up-tick is upon us.
Suain Logistics Pvt Ltd is launching e-commerce portal to find tons of loads for various routes on a PAN India basis as well as to find availability of empty vehicles for various routes on real time basis.
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