HMT Skeleton watches

Through this blog I share information about the HMT Skeleton watches. HMT released four different types of skeleton watches since the 1990s :

1. Hand winding Skeleton  watches
2. Quartz Skeleton watches
3. Jhalak - Semi skeleton watches
4. Automatic Skeleton watches

Out of these the first two were arguably a failure at the time of release and were made in limited quantities and thus have become very rare to come across and even rarer to collect. Let me take you through their journey one by one.

1. Hand winding Skeleton  watches. This watch was released in the early 90s and is popularly known as Sona skeleton watch as it is in a gold plated case and has a gold plated 0231 hand winding movement. The case is relatively thin and the dial has an inner bezel with Roman numeral marking the hour and minutes. The exposed gold plated movement plate has design markings on it adding to its charm and has black color stick hands.These watches came on both leather and gold plated steel bracelets. This watch was released in the 1990s and were not well received by its customer as most of the public attention was towards quartz watches.This is one watch that can be termed super rare and is on the wish list of every HMT watch collector. The same treatment was received there competitor Allwyn's skeleton watches. These Sona skeleton watches became the base for the semi skeleton Jhalak watches 

   

   HMT Hand winding skeleton watch from an HMT watch brochure

   
   

   

   HMT Skeleton watch in person

2. HMT Quartz skeleton watches.These watches were released in 1990s and have HMT 2150 quartz movement with non decorated movement. The inner bezel that acts as a dial had baton/stick/jewel indices and black colored stick hands. These watches also did not appeal the customers because of its looks as more appealing quartz watches were available in the market.This watch is so rare that i am yet to see one in person. Most of the HMT watch collectors are not even aware of its presence.

   

   Skeleton quartz watch

3. HMT Jhalak - Semi skeleton watches. These watches never got their dues from the customers and its only much later that its fan following increased and has now reached a cult status among HMT watch collectors. These watches were released with three dial color variants - White, Yellow and black. These have a pie shaped cavity on the dial between 8 and 10 hour markers through which one can see the decorated gold plated movement plate with the escape wheel in motion. These came on attractive leather straps and just like other HMT skeleton watches came with black colored stick hands.
   
   
   

   

   Picture Courtesy Raja Sekhar

   
   
   
4. HMT Automatic skeleton watches - This is the most expensive automatic watch from the house of HMT. It was released in the year 2013 and was priced at INR 9500 for the gold plated version and INR 9250 for the stainless steel version. Later in the year 2015 its prices were increased to INR 10500 and now they are listed at INR 12440.The versions released in 2013 and 2015 came in two case variants.Golden version came with a fluted bezel and gold plated 8N24 movement and mirror finish golden inner ring and a golden dial.Steel one came with a polished plain bezel and stainless steel movement and a steel mirror finish golden ring and white dial. 8N24 is the skeleton 8205 movement. These had painted blue hands and mineral crystal on top.The dials further came in two variants one with arabic numerals and the other one with studded crystals. The one that has been released in 2018 has polished golden case with white/golden dial and studded crystals along with gold plated 8N24 movement and painted blue hands.The 2018 version is currently listed on the www.hmtwatches.in although i must warn you that these get sold out in seconds.

   

   2013-2015 Crystal studded HMT Automatic skeleton watch Pic courtesy Jayatirtha Karunam

   
   

   

   Arabic numeral Gold plated variant. 2013/2015 issue .Pic courtesy Gaurav Mehta
   

   
   

   

   Arabic numeral stainless steel case version 2013/2015 issue

   
   

   

   2018 issue pic courtesy HMT ltd

   
   

   

   2018 issue pic courtesy HMT

   
   

   

   HMT packaging for 2018 issue . Pic courtesy Ravee C Kuppuswamy 

   
   

   

   HMT packaging for 2018 issue . Pic courtesy Ravee C Kuppuswamy 

   
   

   

   HMT packaging for 2018 issue . Pic courtesy Ravee C Kuppuswamy 

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

I thank you for reading this long block. As always your feedback and suggestions are welcome.

A lucky find – HMT Rakhee

Today is Rakshabandhan, a day that celebrates the bonding between brothers and sisters. On this day, sisters tie a silken thread – Rakhee on their brother’s wrist praying for their long life and the brother’s promise to protect their sisters from every evil.

The house of HMT watches made a special watch in the early 70s to celebrate this festival with a ladies watch called Rakhee. A watch which is both unique as well as refined and was a perfect gift from brother’s to their sisters. It was released in two forms one as a pendent watch (a watch that can be worn around the neck) and the second one on a bracelet. The unique thing about this watch was its case which had a delicate Bidri work. Bidri craft is practised in Bidar-Karnataka, in Andhra Pradesh and in Maharashtra – bordering Karnataka. The metal used is a blackened alloy of zinc and copper inlaid with thin sheets of pure silver. (Source – Craft council of India). Each watch has a hand crafted case with Bidri work and thus each watch has a different and unique case making each HMT Rakhee watch unique and different from the other. These watches came with a 17 jewel hand winding mechanical movement. In my opinion, they are very rarely seen these days as their production stopped decades back.

Picture credit - Tarun Agarwal

Being a watch collector fills your life with excitement. The excitement that can be compared with the one felt by a pearl hunter or an excavator of artifacts. Most collectors talk about the role of luck, of being the right person at the right place. I believe more in the adage – “Harder I work, luckier I get”. But then I have days when luck shines upon me and the incident I am going to narrate here is of one such day and the story of my HMT Rakhee watch

Late in the year 2014, one night I was on call with my friend Jaideep and we were discussing HMT watches. Our discussion digressed to old/Vintage HMT watch advertisements and I started searching them on the net and came across an old HMT watch newspaper advertisement for sale. It was from the 70s and advertised HMT Rakhee watch. I was pleasantly surprised as I read through the advertisement and my admiration for the HMT watch company moved a notch higher. As we discussed, I told Jaideep that we should count ourselves lucky to even know that such an HMT watch even existed and that adding such a watch to our collection is nothing less than a distant dream. It was a Friday night and I had plans for the next day. I dozed off dreaming about HMT Rakhee.

Next morning, I took my wife to the city market area for shopping and quite forgot about the watch amidst the hustle and bustle of the busy market. We started back by afternoon to have lunch at Jaynagar. While driving back I spotted a small shop with a few watches at display. Much to the chagrin of my wife I decided to stop by and check them.  I stepped inside the shop and found the usual assortment of quartz watches on display. Though disappointed, I was also happy that I did not have to spend much time at the shop. As I was stepping out the engaging shopkeeper asked me if he could help me. I told him that I was searching watches with mechanical movements. He directed me to a neglected display case inside the shop. I decided to leave it at that, as we were getting late but the shopkeeper said – atleast take a look, you never know. I sighed and stepped back inside the shop, as my wife rolled her eyes in despair. I looked at the watches and to my utter astonishment there on a leather strap was an HMT Rakhee staring back at me as if asking me of what I was waiting for. A few minutes later I floated out of the shop with a light heart and a lighter pocket, a broad smile and an HMT Rakhee to my wife who stared at me with a magnifying gaze. Later that evening Jaideep was overjoyed with amazement as I narrated him the events of the day. Both agreed that it was nothing less than a great stroke of luck. Next, I bought the original advertisement of this watch and I treasure it now.

I have always believed that HMT watches are full of surprises, most attribute this to the numerous variants and models that were made by this company of which many are unseen and unheard. In my opinion it is also applicable to the collecting aspect of these watches as one might get and unseen gem at most unexpected places.

So that my friend was one lucky day for me which gave me a watch and an experience that I will treasure throughout my life.

Happiest day in the life of an HMT watch collector

As a watch enthusiast, I would often hear from fellow enthusiasts about the watches they got from their father. Here is the story of my father’s gift to me and the happiest day of my life.

My father is my hero and his impact on my life is immense, my love for watches germinated from the time I saw my father’s wrist watch. My father’s daily beater was a Ricoh Japan, automatic movement watch. It had an emeraldish greenish-blue dial, a day-date calendar and was nothing less than a wonder to me. He would put it next to his pillow at night and I would often look at the lumed dots glowing softly in the night and wondered when I would get one for myself. In the 90s his Ricoh watch ended up in his cupboard and was replaced by a Timex watch, which had a quartz movement. This Timex watch stayed on his wrist ever since. He often received other and more expensive watches but the Timex watch ruled his wrist.

My father knew of my obsession with watches and HMT watches in particular and we would often talk about them. Last year when I had visited him, he gave me his Ricoh watch and the child in me got the most cherished object. A couple of years back, I told him that I bought for him an HMT “Provash” automatic, which is quite similar to his first name “Pravesh”, he gave me his evergreen answer “Please don’t get me a watch, I don’t need another watch”. I respected his decision and lost all hopes of seeing another watch on his wrist and thought the Timex will be his daily beater forever.

My Father's Ricoh Japan watch on my wrist today

However, god wanted to fulfil yet another dream of mine. I got a call from my father a few days back and he told me he wants my advice on a wrist watch. He informed me that his Timex watch has stopped working and is with the service center and he has not been wearing any watches for some time. My heart was filled with joy when he said that he wanted to wear an HMT watch from now on. He said that it’s our good old Indian brand and with me always advocating the use of HMT watches he wanted to wear one. As always, his requirements were clear – a gold plated quartz watch with day-date function and dial shape other than round (his timex watch had a round dial and he wanted to try something new). He also said that he did not want many options as it might confuse him and that the day calendar should be in Hindi. After some thought and search, I zeroed down on Sangam Premium MGGG 06 PRE WD. I shared a few pictures with him and he liked it instantly. The only problem was that the day calendar was in English and Japanese while he wanted it to be in Hindi and English. However, when I told the seller about it, he offered to change the Japanese calendar to Hindi and with the change incorporated; watch was shipped.I knew that my father would want to wear the watch on the first day of Navratri and luckily the watch reached him a day earlier. Today, he wore the watch after the pariva pooja of first day of Navratri and sent me a wrist shot. Words fail the expression of my happiness. Today, without even a shadow of doubt, is the happiest day of my life as a son, who also happens to be a watch collector....an HMT watch collector. 

My Father's wrist shot with his HMT Sangam Premium watch

Memory Restored – Restoring the first HMT watch I ever saw

Sometime in the year of 1987, one evening, upon his return from his office, we noticed a beautiful watch on my grandfather’s wrist. It was an HMT HQ series day date quartz watch, a novelty in the days of mechanical watches. That moment was my first introduction to an HMT watch; I was a seven years old then. He had received the watch from his bank as a reward for his exemplary performance at work that day and it replaced the Favre leuba watch that adorned his wrist, till then. It was a proud moment for all of us and the watch became a permanent time keeper for him, till his last breath. Post his demise my uncle started wearing the watch but after a few years he moved on with his other watches and the watch stopped receiving wrist time. Time moved on and from a school going kid, I progressed to college and then became a working professional. Memory of my grandfather’s watch faded in the background of my busy life. A few years back, I was on my way back home from the Bengaluru International Airport, when I spotted HMT Bhavan (Head Office of HMT watches) and memories came rushing back to me. I purchased my first HMT watch the very next day and have been hooked on to HMT watches ever since. I have written about it in my earlier blog (Blog link)

Since that day, I was always curious about the whereabouts of my grandfather’s HMT watch. I made enquiries with my uncle and grandmother but no one was sure about the location of the watch. A couple of months back my aunt visited our ancestral home at Lucknow and upon return handed over the watch which she found after an exhaustive search. It was found t in my grandfather’s office briefcase. The glorious watch was now in a dilapidated state. The strap had broken and the glass had cracked to pieces with dust all over the dial and a dead movement. I was determined to restore the watch to its glory. I took it to a watchmaker; he confirmed that the quartz movement was beyond repair due to spill over of chemicals from the dead battery and exposure to atmosphere. I checked with HMT watches repair centers but they also did not have a spare movement for the watch due to their current state of affairs. I checked with multiple dealers and finally found an unused 2105 original HMT quartz movement for the watch. I got it cosmetically restored by getting a new glass, repairing the strap and cleaning the dial. The watch finally ticked back to its original rhythm.

Old destroyed quartz movement

As I write this blog, the first HMT watch I ever saw, a trophy of my grandfather’s hard work is on my wrist to be treasured for ever and to be passed on to the next generations of our family. HMT watches have been time keepers of our nation but to me they are also timekeepers of generations. 

Restored watch of My Grandfather

New HMT Watch Showroom in Bangalore

I recently visited the HMT watch showroom at Barton Center, M G Road Bangalore. The showroom at unity buildings, J C Road was shut down and shifted to this new facility. Since, not many HMT watch fans are aware of the existence of this new showroom, I decided to share the sights of my visit through this blog.

Barton center is very close to the M G Road metro station on the main road

Barton Center - Its a famous landmark on M.G. Road 

HMT showroom has put a banner on its window which faces the road and an HMT Digital clock (top edge of the pic)

HMT watch showroom is on the first floor, a view from the tube lift

At the entrance of the showroom

The only showcase inside the Huge showroom, which is a property owned by HMT watches for decades. Other showcases were expected in a few days

Watches

It was good to meet Mr. Bhagwan,showroom manager and an old friend. Amidst closure of several showrooms, HMT opening a new showroom is nothing less than a pleasant surprise. So, next time you visit the M G Road, do visit the showroom.