Akshai Varde takes his specially customised Vardenchi bike for a spin in Mumbai

The whine of an arc welder cuts through the silence in Jaipur’s tony Civil Lines.

A peacock strutting across a sprawling lawn, shrieks with shock and flaps off into the distance. Follow the whine and it leads to a dimly lit underground garage where rows of two-wheelers are being taken apart and put back together by a score of oil-stained mechanics.

From a distance, the machines look like any ordinary motorbike you might pass on the street. But step closer and extraordinary differences become obvious. The finished bikes have engraved handlebars with intricate Rajasthani designs while the seats are made from camel leather with etchings that once went onto saddles of Rajput noblemen. The fuel tank caps have gold and silver inlay work that in an earlier era would’ve been on royal swords.

These classy road warriors are being put together by Vijay Singh, the founder and skilful hand behind Rajputana Custom Motorcycles (RCM), which makes bespoke bikes for the two-wheel aficionado determined to stand out.

Zoom away to Mumbai where Akshai Varde, owner of Vardenchi Motorcycles, is also going full throttle turning out made-to-order two wheelers.

Vijay Singh’s first customised bike Original Gangster is lined up next to a restored BSA M20 and the Soorma, powered by a 350cc Royal Enfield engine; (above) the front brake lever is adorned with intricate brasswork. Pic by Rupinder Sharma

For movie star Akshay Kumar — who played a modern Krishna in his latest movie Oh My God —Varde turned out a Royal Enfield Twin Spark into something that looked like a modern-day, two-wheeled chariot. The modified version has fenders with pointed edges that look like a chariot wheel and a solid white body with three-dimensional shooting flames painted along the side. Priced at Rs 10 lakh, the cruiser was reconstructed in 45 days.

Singh and Varde belong to an elite group of bike customisers who are putting their own, utterly unique spin on motorcycle design. They are cranking out handcrafted machines for a clutch of Indian bikers who want to be one-of-a-kind. Says Singh: “I step into the garage before 9 and usually work for 10 hours flat. Still there’s never enough time to take up all the orders that come my way.”

Let’s make no mistake. These aren’t stately Harley Davidson cruisers or sporty Suzuki Hayabusas. These bikes are made to suit the needs of the new Indian biker, who wants to go beyond the superbike when it comes to aesthetics.

Onkarpreet Singh of Delhi’s Modbikes sticks to crafting just five to six exceptional bikes in a year; (below) Air Commodore A.K. Mehta of Dream Riders is teaming up with collaborators in smaller cities. Pic by Rupinder Sharma

And, boy, are these bikes lookers. Take a dekko at Onkarpreet Singh of Delhi’s Modbikes who’s crafting what might be the ultimate fantasy on two wheels. Singh’s Chromed Alien custom bike is 10-ft long (that’s about 1.5 times the size of a standard motorcycle). This bike has a huge and tubby rear tyre and tear-drop shaped fuel tank.

If that’s not startling enough, look even closer. It has massive handlebars that snake upwards and dagger-shaped wheel spokes. This muscular creature has taken eight months to build from scratch at the company’s garage in Kirti Nagar, Delhi.

“A bespoke bike is an extension of your personality. The moment you are riding one, you are making a statement,” says Air Commodore A.K. Mehta, director of the Delhi-based custom bike outfit, Dream Riders. Mehta fabricates around 24 bespoke machines in a year. And business is so good that he’s in talks with collaborators in cities like Pune, Rajkot, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar and Ernakulam to open outposts where more creations will be turned out. A Calcutta-based brand tie-up has already been roadworthy for almost a year.

You could say that Indian motorcycle fabricators are taking their cue from their counterparts in the West like Orange County Choppers, West Coast Choppers, Arlen Ness and Sam Nehme whose creations are the stuff of legends in biker communities.

Now, there are different types of custom-made motorcycles. There are choppers, which are reconstructed after stripping or chopping the original machine completely. Then there are bobbers, where the front fenders are taken off and rear ones dwarfed or bobbed. The third category is the cruiser, large bikes like the ones Harley Davidson is famous for.

Glance around Vijay Singh’s basement garage and it’s obvious that business is in high gear. There are 10 or 11 bikes in various stages of being stripped to the bone. Most are Royal Enfields but there’s also a Harley Davidson waiting to be turned into a chopper. In another corner is an antique 1942 BSA M20, the bike that carried the British army through World War II. One of Singh’s most famous creations is the Rajmata, an iconic Harley Davidson 48 Sportster that wowed visitors at this year’s Delhi Auto Expo.

It must be said that a celebrity fan following enormously boosts the glamour of modified bikes in India. The parade of flashy names with superbikes and custom choppers includes the likes of Shahid Kapoor, John Abraham and M.S. Dhoni. Vardenchi’s client list includes Akshay Kumar, Jackie Shroff and Karan Singh Grover.

Then, there’s Vipul Shah, director of movies like Namastey London and Action Replay, who has turned to Ego Custom Wheels, a Navi Mumbai outfit run by Jignesh Mistry, Akil Sayyed and Rannvijay Singh. “Shah told us he wanted the best-looking bike. Also, the exhaust needed to be put in front of the engine so that his kids could sit comfortably,” says Mistry. The result is a massive ego-booster with the biggest rear tyre among Indian choppers — over 300mm (regular on-road bike tyres measure around 130mm) Avon Venom tyre imported from the US.

Turning a regular factory-made motorcycle into a custom-made one-off is, of course, a complex process. First, the frames of the bikes are stripped away. And then all new elements like, exhaust pipes, seats, headlamp, chassis and even the fuel tank are crafted at the workshop. Nothing but the engine remains of the old bike. Even for older restored bikes, many parts are chucked and vintage parts in prime condition are sourced over the Internet or imported.

Inevitably, custom bike manufacturers are enthusiastic bikers themselves. But they are assisted by a team of designers, welders, machinists and painters. Mehta of Dreamriders, for instance, employs five people along with several consultants across the country. The team includes two engineers who work on the AutoCAD software for designing.

Varde has an even bigger staff that includes the best technically-qualified people. He says: “We have a 20-man technical team looking after design R&D, metal fabrication, Paint Shop, Chrome plant, along with assembly and testing. It takes 284 man-hours to create a Vardenchi.”

Like Vardenchi, Khalid Shaikh of Mumbai’s Khalidaro Designs has a core team to help with metal carving and state-of-the-art air brush painting.

Given the elaborate process, it’s inevitable that putting these bikes together takes months. Since Shaikh’s forte is theme bikes, he takes on just eight to nine projects a year. In addition, he crafts 20 other basic cruisers. A Scorpion-themed chopper by Khalidaro, inspired by the movie The Mummy Returns has its swingarm and handlebars shaped like scorpion claws and the stinging tail respectively. Shaikh’s own Mustang-themed bike has a GPS system, a cigarette lighter, waterproof music system and headlights integrated into the fuel tank.

Khalid Shaikh likes to create theme- based bikes that are often inspired by action movies

So, what prompts these designers to spend an entire year designing just a dozen bikes? “I would rather build a Madhubala than a Rakhi Sawant,” says Singh of RCM, which back in 2010 had 143 pending orders. He’s cut down on his output since and concentrates on just 12 exceptional bikes a year.

“I get 30 request calls each day but I don’t want to expand the business. It’s pure passion.”

Similarly, for Onkarpreet Singh brand building equals quality control. “Custom bikes are expressions of art and I stick to making five to six units a year,” says Singh, whose office walls are plastered with charcoal sketches of prohibitively-expensive superbikes across the world.

Indeed, prices of custom motorcycles can be quite intimidating. RCM’s Rajmata is pegged at a neat Rs 16 lakh (including the price of the Harley.)

Vardenchi is equally focused on delivering more bang for your buck. “Although some critical components like braking and suspension remain the same, no two Vardenchis are alike,” says the 32-year-old whose chopper customisation charges can range from Rs 1.8 lakh to Rs 3.95 lakh.

Still for both manufacturers and bikers, it’s not really about the money or the business. It’s about arriving in a cloud of dust on a pair of designer wheels.