The Rise and Fall of Reversing Horns in Cars in India

The Rise:

With the introduction of affordable car manufacturing companies like Maruti-Suzuki and Hyundai in our country, we saw a rise in the number of vehicles on the road. The decade of the 1990s saw a lot of cars coming in with no driver aid for rearward visibility except for the rearview mirrors. With a major motive of giving an aural warning to the vehicles and people near the rear end of the car, the backup horn or reverse horn thus came into the market as a driver's aid when parking in reverse or taking U-turns. Initially, these reverse horns were simple buzzers giving beeps when the reverse gear was engaged. With the upcoming electronic developments, these horns transformed from simple beeping accessories to style statements. The reverse horns started coming with a variety of audio output to choose from. These outputs were generally badly interpreted instrumental music pieces from Indian movies, advertisements and also some international classic music pieces. The reverse horn obsession amongst the Indian car owners grew to such an extent that cars used to be recognized by their reverse horn sound.

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The Fall:

The increasing number of cars and the increasing volume of their reverse horns had surely started troubling everyone on the streets. During the late 2000s, the reverse parking horn turned from style statement to mere noise. This hatred also started showing in the newspapers, which was the only strong media channel back then. Now, the reverse parking horn was no longer a driving aid but a sheer nuisance. Though the reverse horns had turned into a nuisance, there was no other effective reverse drive aid available in the market. The high-end cars from German manufacturers like Mercedes, BMW and Audi had started coming with reverse parking sensors, which was quite a niche technology back then. It was the low-cost adaptation and development of this technology that was the main reason for the downfall of the reverse horns.

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The Extinction:

The 2010s decade was when the reverse horns went extinct in the Indian market. It was in this decade that technologies like reverse parking sensors and reverse parking cameras started becoming more and more affordable due to technological advancements. This technological development did not go unnoticed by the RTO and ARAI authorities. Taking into consideration the increasing number of cars on the road and affordability of the new reverse driving aid technologies, the authorities finally released a law in the year 2016, which completely banned the use of reverse horns in cars in India. With the fallen prices of aftermarket reverse parking sensors almost matching the price of reverse horns, this law was accepted by everyone without any hesitation. Thus, India saw an end to a technology that had once become a style statement in the market.

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The Survival:

Though the use of reverse horns is banned in cars by law, these horns, devoid of the flashy music tunes, are still functional in trucks, dumpers and other construction vehicles where rearward visibility is almost absent.