I’m trying to work out a way of doing the usual India-to-England route on an Indian-bought Enfield. It’s proving problematic, so I’m hoping someone has some ideas on how to proceed.

Disregarding potential war-related problems on the way home, I’m struggling with the difficulty thrown up by the announcement in April 2002 that carnets will not now be issued for a vehicle purchased in India or bearing Indian registration plates, as described at:
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/ubb...ML/000187.html

Hoping that this wouldn’t be enforced, I spoke to the carnet-issuing Sue Collins at the RAC, but it took her all of thirty seconds to start reading the announcement to me. In view of Stefan’s problems in Germany, it seems unlikely that the ADAC would be more amenable.

So what’s the solution? I don’t fancy my chances of managing it without a carnet. My best idea so far has been to buy and register the bike in Nepal, since the carnet restriction then shouldn’t apply. This has the slight disadvantage that Nepal imposes a forty percent import duty, which makes the bike rather more expensive than it would be in India, but at least Enfields are now being imported into Nepal. I’ve been in touch with the distributor there; they claim it would be no problem for a foreigner to buy and register a bike there, and say they recently sold three Bullets to some Belgians.

However, they also claimed that they had a Euro Classic bike (i.e. the export model that conforms to the so-called European whole-vehicle type approval), whereas Royal Enfield in India say that this is not true. The regulations on importing motorcycles into Britain will tighten up on 17th June 2003 and while it may be possible to import a non-approved bike after that date (the process is still being finalised), it will certainly be much easier to import an approved one. I’m waiting to hear back from Royal Enfield as to whether they would be able to supply a European model to Nepal, but it wasn’t looking promising.

It is still permissible for non-resident foreigners to buy a bike in India for immediate export, so perhaps in principle I could buy the bike in India and personally export it directly to Nepal/Pakistan (not that hanging around in Pakistan is such a good plan right now). I imagine this would be an interesting bureaucratic challenge, and the same question still hangs over the availability of the European model in India. Plus I then wouldn't be able to ride around India, but I guess I could rent a bike there.

Are there any other options?

James