For Vimal Kishore, buying a car was supposed to make travelling easier. But when the Prayagraj resident bought a Maruti Alto in 2011, he found that owning a conventional car did not solve his problem. His disability, which affects his legs, prevented him from driving it.
Instead of giving up on the idea of travelling independently, Kishore decided to build a vehicle suited to his needs. Using scooter parts and materials sourced from discarded vehicles, he developed Lailo, a two-seater car that he built for Rs 90,000.
The vehicle has since been equipped with features including solar power, GPS and a rear-view camera.
How the idea for Lailo took shape
“It was difficult plying on a two-wheeler so I decided to modify the vehicle to suit my needs,” Kishore told ET Auto in 2016. Kishore’s first step was to put his idea on paper. He researched the design on the internet before beginning work on the vehicle, using materials and spare parts he could obtain. “It all started with a design on paper after researching on the Internet,” he told
ET Auto.
As per the report, he invested in aluminium composite panel sheets to make the car’s body, along with a battery, four wheels, solar panels and an all-weather bulb intended to help in foggy winter conditions.
He sourced door handles, wipers, front glass and other spare parts from owners of old Ambassador cars that had been discarded.
Even the wiring came from his own home.
The project was built around a practical concern: keeping the vehicle stable on the road. According to Kishore, maintaining balance was the most difficult part of the process, which led him to opt for four wheels.
He converted a scooter into a car himself, while workers without specialised skills helped mould the body. The result was a two-seater, battery-operated vehicle designed specifically for people with disabilities.
Solar-powered lights and a music system
Lailo was not simply a scooter fitted with a different body. Kishore also incorporated features that could make the vehicle more useful in everyday travel.
“The car’s hooter and lights operate on solar panels. There is also a music system which is also solar-powered, the panels being placed atop the car’s roof.”
According to The
Better India report, additional features, including GPS and a rear-view camera, and puts the cost of the vehicle at Rs 90,000.
Kishore’s approach has been to adapt existing materials and components rather than depend entirely on new parts. Discarded Ambassador components, household wiring and scooter parts helped him turn a design into a working vehicle.
Photo Courtesy: Instagram/@The Prayagraj Stories
A coffee seller who builds machines from waste
Kishore’s work on Lailo is part of a broader interest in making useful devices from discarded materials. He runs a small coffee stall in Prayagraj, using his earnings to support his experiments.
According to
ET Auto, his other creations at the time included a power bank, a cooler made from a discarded fibre drum, a doorbell that worked without electricity, a vacuum supply machine and an instrument that could pump air into vehicle tyres. The report noted that these devices used recycled or waste materials and required little maintenance.
One of his best-known creations is a miniature working charkha measuring just 2.5 cm. His inventions had earned him recognition, including an award from former President APJ Abdul Kalam.
Kishore was eight months old when a severe fever affected his legs. As he grew up, he became interested in taking objects apart and putting them back together, exploring how everyday things could be made to work differently. His car emerged from that same habit of experimentation. Faced with a mobility challenge that a conventional vehicle could not resolve for him, he used his own experience to identify a problem and worked towards building an alternative.
Lailo is the result: a vehicle assembled from available parts, designed around his needs and developed with resources he could afford. For Kishore, the project began with a simple difficulty in everyday commuting. It became an attempt to create a solution for himself - and potentially for others facing similar challenges.