Premier Automobiles Limited
company
Premier Ltd (formerly known as The Premier Automobiles Limited) was an Indian automotive manufacturer company, based in Mumbai. The company was owned by the Walchand Group and was established by Walchand Hirachand as Premier Automobiles Ltd (PAL) in 1944 with the encouragement and support of Sir. M. Visvesvaraya. The company was founded in 1903 as Walchand-Phatak Co. Later on, the name was changed to TATA Constructions. Further, after the exit of TATA's name was again changed to Premier which was engaged in work of contract & construction business. In October 1947, Premier Ltd manufactured the first Indian made trucks and cars rolled out onto the streets of independent India. Premier is well-known for its Premier Padmini which ruled the Indian car market and its popularity peaked during 1970s and 80s.
History
The company was established in 1941 and negotiated with Chrysler Corporation for licenses to build a Plymouth car and a Dodge truck, sold under the Dodge, Plymouth, DeSoto, and Fargo names starting around 1949. In the early years, quality was considered good by both Chrysler and the Indian Department of Defense.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q268808. VIAF identifies the subject as 145539983. The Library of Congress control number is n89184731. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1944, 1903, 1947 and 1941.
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This entry incorporates text from “Premier Automobiles Limited” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.