The Business Standard Motoring Bike Of The Year 2004 is...

We said last year that there were few launches. This year, we cannot complain of the same, but once we removed the variants/cosmetic tweaks from the list of contenders, it was a clear two-way battle.

A battle that would clearly go down to the wire and something you could not predict.

The battle was between the Hero Honda Karizma, India's biggest contemporary motorcycle and current performance king, and its competition, the Bajaj Wind 125 "� India's first bike designed with the export market in mind.

It was a long hard tussle, but in a world where fuel economy is still king, the performance numbers of the Karizma just could not ignore the Wind's superior fuel economy and a price far easier on the wallet.

The Wind also scores better for its build quality and refinement. Winning the title probably just underscores the fact that the Wind is a better all-round commuter than the Karizma, which is a big, lifestyle bike.

Maybe in the coming years we would take a second look at the evaluation methodology which currently takes sides with bikes that are economical to buy and run. And perhaps then, bigger, more performance-oriented motorcycles will get the nod "� but that is for another day.

As we said in our road test, the Wind 125 is a benchmark amongst executive commuters. It's easily the best motorcycle in this exploding, tightly crammed segment of our market "� and is the Business Standard Motoring Bike Of The Year 2004.

Congratulations, Bajaj!