Car holders

“Cars were considered a male domain but even in the early 1900s the maharanis and the British memsahibs who drove around in their Chevrolets,Buicks and Cadillacs proved otherwise. This is just one fascinating aspect of vintage cars,” says Titus,who has schoolchildren coming to his 22,000 sq ft museum. “Sometimes,the entire family posed with the car,like one would with the patriarch of a family,” says Titus.

Friend and fellow car enthusiast Sandeep Katari is close behind in his endeavour to showcase his photographs and will be opening his collection at his Chhattarpur villa. “My collection looks mainly at the 1920s advertisements,photographs of the royalty with cars and some of the early cars that the middle class took to,” says Katari. A restorer of old cars,he has been a collector of memorabilia for 10 years. There are some glass negatives,which when developed,show fascinating images from early British India — maharajas on their hunts and royal families in procession. “I plan to organise a space for my permanent collection,” says Katari.

Deepak Jain’s store All Arts at Hauz Khas Village is a great place to pick up black-and-white and colour posters. There are early adverts of Mobiloi car lubricant,Fargo buses and “Hindusthan the only cars manufactured in India”. “We are never sure what we are going to find,but we go on buying trips and are constantly in touch with our suppliers to get images that reflect the past,” says Jain.

He is a major supplier for collectors like Titus,Katari and Tarun Thakral. The gentle competition between collectors leads them to look beyond Delhi. “Bindra Studios in Simla is a great supplier of negatives and old photographs since theirs were the official photographers of the kings who visited the summer capital,” says Titus. Even the funeral procession of a British officer makes for fascinating study. The car that doubles as a hearse is surrounded by grieving relatives and working class men who want to get a glimpse. “The car-related aspirations of the lower- and upper middle class have been depicted over decades,” says Titus.