Tata Nano car sales sink by 85%

Tata Nano car sales sink by 85% - BBC Business

Sales of Tata Motors' Nano, the world's cheapest car, plunged by 85% in November compared with a year earlier, the Indian carmaker has said.

It blamed the slump on the difficulty potential customers had in accessing loans to buy the car.

About 70,000 Nano cars have been sold in India

However, analysts pointed out that a series of fires in the Nano, as well as price rises, had also affected sales.

Tata said its total sales across all models in November were 54,622, a rise of 1% on a year earlier.

The carmaker also said that sales of its Jaguar Land Rover-branded models "continued their upward trend".

Fire hazard

However, the company said it had sold just 509 Nanos during November.

During the month, Tata offered free safety upgrades for the model, which went on sale last year.

Incidents of the Nano catching fire have been reported

his came after owners of the hatchback reported about half a dozen fires since April last year. There were no injuries.

The Nano was introduced to India in April 2009 and there are now about 70,000 of them on the country's roads.

The basic Nano costs about 100,000 rupees ($2,205; £1,414).

Picasso's electrician reveals artist's 'treasure trove'

Picasso's electrician reveals artist's 'treasure trove' - BBC News Europe

A retired electrician in southern France who worked for Pablo Picasso says he has hundreds of previously unknown works by the artist.

The works include a portrait of the late artist's first wife, Olga

The treasure trove of 271 pieces includes lithographs, cubist paintings, notebooks and a watercolour and is said to be worth about 60m euros (£50.6m).

Pierre Le Guennec, 71, reportedly says Picasso gave him the works as gifts.

But the estate's administrators have filed a case for alleged illegal receipt of the works of art.

According to French newspaper Liberation, the lost Picassos include a watercolour from his Blue Period. Experts say the nine cubist works in Mr Le Guennec's possession are worth 40m euros alone.

Legal battle

The electrician installed burglar alarm systems at Picasso's numerous houses in France, including his villa in Cannes, during the three years before the artist died in 1973.

In September, Mr Le Guennec approached the artist's estate in an attempt to get the canvases authenticated by Picasso's son, Claude.

But Claude Picasso dismissed Mr Le Guennec's explanation about how he came into possession of the art works.

He said his father would never have given so many works to a single person.

"To give away such a large quantity, that's unheard of. It doesn't add up," he told Liberation. "It was a part of his life."

Once the works were authenticated, the family contacted France's specialist art police who have reportedly already raided Mr Le Guennec's home on the Cote d'Azur, confiscating the paintings and interviewing him under caution.

The BBC's Christian Fraser, in Paris, says a multimillion-euro legal battle over the ownership of the paintings will now begin.

New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art says Picasso produced more than 20,000 works of art during his long career, but hundreds have been listed as missing - in part because he was so prolific, the AP news agency reports.