LET IT SIMMER

In your head, that is. Motorcyclists in India have been begging for a motorcycle like this for years on end – quick, crisp handling, great-looking and with brand value to boot. It’s the cohesiveness of the package that brings the whole experience together. The Duke is the motorcycle equivalent of The Problem Child and you can almost spot the mischievous glint in its eyes. It isn’t just the styling that screams ‘streetfighter’, it’s the whole motorcycle. Who would’ve thought? It took the combined efforts of Bajaj and KTM to come up with a world-class motorcycle that raises the bar not just in India but on a global platform.

SERVE WITH GARNISH AND SALT TO TASTE

Salt to rub it in, come to think of it. You’d think that with a motorcycle so good, there’s bound to be a catch. If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is, right? Wrong.

For all its awesomeness, it’s priced – introductorily at least – at Rs 1.18 lakh, ex-Delhi, undercutting the closest competitor (not a rival in the true sense; both achieve different objectives) by nearly thirty grand! That’s a huge margin and essentially, a milestone in Indian motorcycling history. Sure, some might argue that its focus is narrow but I look at it as a good thing. Like we made films that had to have everything – action, humour, romance, drama, dance and what have you – for too long, we expected our motorcycles to do everything too, even if it meant expecting contradictory things (not that we could tell anyway). Now though, it feels like we’ve grown up, understanding what we want and here’s a motorcycle that reflects just that. That it’s mastered the art of cooking Japanese is just an added advantage, then.