ADAS – a feature that has been increasingly gaining momentum in the Indian market. What started off as a segment-first on the Mahindra XUV700, this feature is slowly making its way into lower segments as well. But is ADAS on Indian roads what we need right now? Let’s talk about this.
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What is ADAS?
ADAS stands for Advanced Driver Assistance System. What this does is that it reads the roads via a slew of sensors and cameras and lets the car make its decisions according to the surroundings. It surely is an ever-evolving and highly data-dependent system. Using ADAS, cars can change lanes, slow down or speed up, and bring themselves to a complete halt with minimal human interference.
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How ADAS help?
Well, when configured properly, ADAS can be a very dependable safety feature. Features like Forward Collision Warning, Auto-Emergency Braking, Lane-keep Assist, Blind-spot Monitoring and Cross Traffic Alert can exponentially decrease the chances of an accident. Many foreign countries have plenty ADAS equipped cars that are running on their roads and people definitely love it!
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Do we need ADAS on Indian Roads?
Is the requirement persistent? YES. Is it sustainable? As of now – NO. For regular Indian city roads, ADAS cannot be relied on because Lane Discipline is a rare sight in India. Moreover, there are countless sections where the lanes aren’t visibly divided on our roads, which makes it very difficult for the system to keep the car in a straight line. However, on bigger highways and expressways, ADAS can prove to be an excellent feature. It not only keeps the car in control, but it also significantly reduces the fatigue we experience after a long drive.
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Is ADAS on Indian Roads a gimmick?
If you see it from a manufacturers’ perspective, yes ADAS on Indian roads is sort of a gimmick. However, it is only a matter of a few years. In the near future, the share of ADAS equipped cars present in the market will slowly start increasing as more and more cars will come equipped with it. With the EV revolution coming our way, this future stands no more than 5 years ahead of us!
To conclude, if you’re buying a car just because it has ADAS, don’t. The systems are fairly new and they will get significantly better with newer models. As of now, ADAS on Indian roads doesn’t look like a very attractive feature.
