Limos are becoming a very familiar sight in one Indian town

Ludhiana is a small town in the northern state of Punjab in India which is slowly being taken over by stretch limousines. Car hire bosses and taxi drivers have taken advantage of a legal loophole in their local law which means that taxi cabs are not required to pay car tax.

Nothing says success like a shiny luxurious limo, which is why so many of these elongated vehicles are showing up in the town. The limousine is a serious status symbol and taxi owners are keen to display their wealth with a fleet of stretch limos.

It seems no taxi owner in the town wants to be outdone by another, which is why the number of limos is multiplying rapidly as the businessmen play a game of keeping-up- with-the-joneses. One taxi boss estimated there were about 400 limos in the Ludhiana already, he guessed the town could only cope with a further 100 before the roads became grid-locked with the stretch vehicles.

A limo dealer from Ludhiana, 46-year-old Amit Aggarwal, explained the town’s obsession with the stretch limo: “We’re a small place with big plans and having a limousine is a man’s opportunity to show off his status”

Despite the abundance of luxury cars in the town, the locals’ preferred form of transport is either a bicycle or a donkey.