The Jawahar, with its hand-winding mechanical movement, dates back to the early-1970s
I
just bought a new watch. Only, this ‘new’ watch is around 55 years old, which
makes it just a bit older than I am. It’s an HMT Jawahar, which is powered by a
17-jewel mechanical hand-winding movement. I bought it from a seller in
Calcutta, whom I came across on a Facebook group for HMT watch enthusiasts. The
deal was surprisingly hassle-free. I got in touch with the seller and asked him
to send some photos of the watch, which he did. The watch looked clean and I liked
it. Made the payment. He sent the watch via India Post which, as one may expect,
did get the watch all the way from Calcutta to Greater Noida but did not
deliver it to my house, making up some excuse about the door being locked at
the time of attempted delivery. Yeah, right. In any case, the post office is
not too far from my house and I went there, spoke to some guy who was sitting
in a corner sorting mail and assorted packages, and he in turn spoke to another
guy who found my package sitting in a random cupboard and handed it over to me
after making me sign a piece of paper. And with that, I became the proud owner
of a really, really old mechanical watch, one that I’ve been wanting to
get my hands on for the last many months.
The Jawahar was one of the first watches to be manufactured by HMT Watches, which was set up in Bangalore in 1961. This was in collaboration with one of the biggest watch companies in Japan, Citizen. The Jawahar is powered by the HMT 0231 hand-winding movement, which I’m told is essentially an adaptation of Citizen's 0201 movement that incorporates the latter’s ‘Parashock’ shock protection system. And indeed, ‘Parashock 17 Jewels’ is imprinted on the Jawahar’s dial – a nice little touch for people like me, who love to wallow in horological nostalgia.
The Jawahar was one of the first watches to be manufactured by HMT Watches, which was set up in Bangalore in 1961. This was in collaboration with one of the biggest watch companies in Japan, Citizen. The Jawahar is powered by the HMT 0231 hand-winding movement, which I’m told is essentially an adaptation of Citizen's 0201 movement that incorporates the latter’s ‘Parashock’ shock protection system. And indeed, ‘Parashock 17 Jewels’ is imprinted on the Jawahar’s dial – a nice little touch for people like me, who love to wallow in horological nostalgia.