There was a time when the Kings were ruling the country and were so rich even the Britishers were feeling jealous of the Kings and were afraid to go against them. Similarly, there was a king named Maharaja Jai Singh of Alwar, Rajasthan. Today we have brought you the story of Maharaja Jai Singh v/s the famous car company Rolls Royce.
Before knowing the exact story I want to share some facts with you so that you can relate and think, even in those days having a Rolls Royce was a prestige for rich people. Before the First World War, the company had built more than 20,000 Rolls Royce cars and interestingly 20% were imported by India.
In 1920, Maharaja from Alwar, Jai Singh was spending his time in London but he doesn’t want to showcase his status.
One day he was wearing the normal outfit and walking across the streets of Mayfair Area, London. He saw Rolls Royce’s car showroom and went in to buy the car because he was crazy about luxury automobiles.
He saw the Rolls Royce, which was visually attractive, and soon wanted to know the features and price, so he asked a salesman who was standing there. The salesman looked at him and had the impression that he was a poor Indian due to his appearance and sent Maharaja outside without informing him about the car features.
Maharaja Jai Singh angrily reached his Hotel and only one thing was in his mind to teach Rolls Royce a lesson. Again he changed his dress like a King and ordered his servant to call the showroom and tell them Maharaja Jai Singh is coming to buy the car.
Maharaja Jai Singh of Alwar, Rajasthan
Soon after the Maharaja arrived in the showroom, there was a grand welcome with Red carpets and all salesmen lined up to honor the king. There were only 6 cars present over there and the king bought them all with the cash. The people in the showroom were astonished to see by seeing such a big order.
Not only that he also asked to deliver to India along with the salesman, Rolls Royce company was happy but the King’s game was yet to start. After reaching he ordered the local municipality to use these Rolls Royce cars to collect garbage around the city.
By seeing this the salesman who sent Maharaja Jai Singh outside was shocked to see the incident and understood his mistake.
The news got spread like a wildfire, and the people who were using Rolls Royce felt very embarrassed to drive their cars, the sales and revenue of the company went down, the reputation of Rolls Royce fell all over the world.
Rolls Royce finally understood their mistake, wrote a telegram to Maharaja Jai Singh asking for an apology, and also asked to stop using their cars for garbage collection in return they said they will send 6 more Rolls Royce Cars for free.
From this story one thing we can understand is that never judge a person by his appearance, it was a great lesson for Rolls Royce and even for us.
