Door-opened Bajaj

In Jakarta, there are a lot of blue three-wheeled vehicles on the road. When you walk on a big road, you may see a lot of them parked in a row near an intersection. There were also several blue vehicles parked near Gambir station. These auto tricycle taxis are called Bajaj in Indonesia. They look similar to the auto-rickshaw in India and Sri Lanka's three-wheeler.

It's no wonder that Bajaj is seen in Jakarta, auto-rickshaws running in India, and three-wheelers running in Sri Lanks are made by the same manufacturer. They were manufactured by the India-based automaker, Bajaj Auto Limited.

Even though they were made by the same manufacturer and had the same model number, they were called differently in different countries. Originally, in India, they call motorized rickshaw an auto-rickshaw. In Sri Lanka, it is called as it looks. The vehicle has three wheels so it is called 'Three Wheeler'. On the other hand, Bajaj in Indonesia is an abbreviation of the manufacturer's name. The long sound of "Bajaj" has been lost and the final "j" has been transferred to "I" here.

The people at Bajaj Auto must have been very happy to see the company name change to a common name, even if it's a bit of a change.