Hindustan Motors (HM) wants to return to vehicle manufacturing at Uttarpara, this time with electric vehicles. The CK Birla Group company has approached the West Bengal government seeking land for an EV plant that would be set up through a joint venture with either a European or an American carmaker.
That immediately raises the obvious enthusiast question: could the Ambassador come back as an electric sedan? The answer is that an Ambassador EV is possible in theory, but there is no evidence that it is part of the current proposal. There is also a major ownership complication that makes a simple Hindustan Motors revival impossible.
Image: Wikipedia
West Bengal’s commerce and industries minister Tapas Roy has confirmed that Hindustan Motors representatives have met him more than once about the project and that the state is considering the request. Company sources say two potential partners are in the picture, one European and one American.
The proposed location is Uttarpara, where Hindustan Motors once operated a roughly 700-acre factory and built the Ambassador for decades. Production there was suspended indefinitely in 2014. The company had earlier sold portions of the land, while the state resumed about 395 acres in November 2022 after citing non-use and failure to revive operations.
Hindustan Motors challenged that decision, but the Supreme Court dismissed its appeal in July 2025. The new proposal therefore depends first on the state making land available again. HM says it can submit a concrete EV manufacturing plan once that happens.
This is not the company’s first attempt. It had signed an MoU with a European manufacturer in 2022 for an EV project at Uttarpara, but that plan was dropped after the land was resumed by the state.
This is where the Ambassador speculation needs caution. Hindustan Motors sold the Ambassador brand, including its trademarks, to Peugeot SA in 2017 for Rs 80 crore. Peugeot subsequently became part of Stellantis. That means Hindustan Motors cannot simply put the Ambassador badge on a new electric sedan because it once manufactured the original.
Any production revival carrying the Ambassador name would require the current rights holder to use the trademark itself or to license or transfer those rights. Nothing in the present Uttarpara proposal says that is happening, and neither of the possible EV partners has been identified.
There have been plenty of modern Ambassador EV concepts and conversions. A recent digital rendering imagined it as a large luxury electric VIP sedan, while separate engineering projects have converted old Ambassador taxis to electric power. Those are interesting demonstrations of how the shape could translate to an EV, but they are not production plans from Hindustan Motors.
If the name were ever revived, the engineering brief would also have to be completely new. The original Ambassador was based on a 1950s Morris Oxford architecture and ended production after falling far behind modern standards for safety, efficiency, performance and features.
An electric revival would therefore need a new platform, crash structure, battery system, electronics and cabin, with only the design identity and name linking it to the old car. That is exactly why a large retro-styled electric sedan is an appealing idea, but also why it would be an expensive project rather than a simple restart.