Two things are said about HMT, and both are wrong. One is that HMT is back. The other is that it is only clearing a warehouse. The company that made the watches was closed by government order on 13 January 2016 and has not reopened. Yet its parent assembled ₹9.05 crore of watches in 2024-25 and booked ₹14.83 crore of sales. Neither the obituary nor the comeback story survives the accounts.
HMT Watches Limited has been closed since 2016. The watches sold today are assembled and sold by the parent, HMT Limited, through its Auxiliary Business Division in Bengaluru. Prices run ₹1,533 to ₹2,800, checked 30 August 2026, with no import duty inside them. There is also no published warranty period and no service network.
Snapshot
- Watch business began
- 1961, Bengaluru, with Citizen Watch Co. of Japan
- Parent company
- H.M.T. Limited, incorporated 7 February 1953 — a listed Government of India enterprise under the Ministry of Heavy Industries
- The watch subsidiary
- HMT Watches Limited, incorporated 9 August 1999, closed since 2016
- Who sells the watches now
- HMT Limited, Auxiliary Business Division, Jalahalli, Bengaluru
- Where they are made
- Assembled in Bengaluru; movement supplier not disclosed
- Price band in India
- ₹1,533 to ₹2,800, checked 30 August 2026
- Warranty and service
- No warranty period and no service network published
How it started
H.M.T. Limited was incorporated on 7 February 1953 as Hindustan Machine Tools. In 1961 the government handed it the job of making India’s watches, with Citizen Watch Co. of Japan as the partner. That July a hundred HMT employees went to Citizen’s Tokyo factory for a year. Citizen’s staff then spent a year in Bangalore setting up the line, and Nehru released the first batch in 1962.
That is a technical collaboration and a technology transfer. No source establishes equity, a licence fee or a royalty in either direction, so “joint venture” is a phrase to avoid. HMT was wholly government-owned throughout.
The corporate history then splits, and this is where most accounts go wrong. HMT made watches from 1961, but a company called HMT Watches Limited was carved out of the parent only in 1999. A third company, HMT Chinar Watches Limited, was incorporated on 4 September 2000 and held the Srinagar plant and a Jammu assembly unit. Srinagar was never an HMT Watches Limited site after that. HMT Watches Limited had three: Bangalore, Tumkur and Ranibagh.
- H.M.T. LimitedIncorporated 7 February 1953; watch business from 1961
- HMT Watches LimitedCarved out as a subsidiary, 9 August 1999
- Closure orderedGovernment Order I-050II/6/2014-PE-X, 13 January 2016
- HMT Limited, Auxiliary Business DivisionAssembles and sells the watches today, at Jalahalli
The brand outlived the company that carried its name, which is why both the comeback story and the obituary fail.
What they actually make
The catalogue runs to about sixty references, and the historic names are back as collections — Janata, Jawan Automatic, Pilot Automatic, Sona, Kanchan and Kohinoor among them. Movements are hand-wound, automatic and quartz. The calibre that built the brand was the HMT 020, based on a Citizen design, with 17 jewels and a glucydur balance. Time+Tide reported in 2024 that current watches take Miyota and Citizen movements; HMT discloses no supplier itself.
Now the correction that matters. “HMT only sells old stock” is the most repeated claim about the brand, and it is checkably wrong. HMT Limited’s audited accounts carry a production line labelled “Assembly of Watches”, and it has risen three years running.
- 2022-23₹7.25 crore assembled, ₹8.04 crore sold
- 2023-24₹7.95 crore assembled, ₹11.86 crore sold
- 2024-25₹9.05 crore assembled, ₹14.83 crore sold
A company emptying a warehouse does not report a production line, and certainly not one that grows.
HMT Limited, annual reports 2023-24 and 2024-25. The sales line also includes tractor spare parts.
What HMT Watches costs in India
On HMT’s own site on 30 August 2026, prices ran from ₹1,533 for a Galaxy VG1L11 Y to ₹2,800 for a Vihaan XGSL 03, with the Pace series at ₹2,200 to ₹2,750. The filter offers a band up to “₹10,000+”, but nothing at that level was on sale.
Here HMT breaks the pattern every imported watch follows. A Swiss or Japanese watch picks up 20% basic customs duty, an agriculture cess, a social welfare surcharge and 18% IGST on the landed value — roughly 49% all in. That duty falls on landed transfer value, not the shelf price, so it adds far less than 49% to what you pay. But it adds something, and HMT pays none of it.
- HMT price in India
- ₹1,533 to ₹2,800
- Import duty inside that price
- Nil — assembled in Bengaluru
- Cost to an overseas buyer
- Up to three times the Indian price, through a forwarding service
- Checked on
- 30 August 2026
India is the cheapest place on earth to buy an HMT, and the only place you can buy one directly. The site ships within India alone.
| Brand | Entry price | Movement |
|---|---|---|
| HMT | ₹1,533, range to ₹2,800 | Hand-wound, automatic and quartz |
| Sonata | ₹695 | Titan quartz |
| Titan core range | ₹1,795 to ₹77,995 | Titan quartz; Miyota for most mechanicals |
Prices checked 30 August 2026. Sonata undercuts HMT and beats it comprehensively on distribution, but sells nothing mechanical. That is the whole HMT proposition: a hand-wound or automatic watch at ₹2,000 to ₹2,800 has no competitor in India. Movement type is the reason to buy one, not nostalgia — our analog and digital comparison sets out what each type costs over ten years.
Service cost is the other half of a price, and here HMT publishes nothing — no service centre list, no pricing, no interval, no parts policy. The warranty page carries a full exclusions list, from wear and tear to straps and postage, and demands the original cash bill and a completed certificate of guarantee for any claim. It states no duration at all. HMT Limited employed 45 people in total on 31 March 2025, across every business it runs, and forty-five people cannot staff a national service network.
Who HMT Watches is actually for
The buyer HMT suits is specific. You want a mechanical watch, your budget is under ₹3,000, and you either know a local watchmaker or will find one. You accept that servicing it is your problem.
It does not suit a gift, or anyone who needs a warranty they can point at. A quartz watch from a brand with a counter in your city is the better answer there — see our everyday and college watch guide and our wider watch brand coverage.
Reputation and controversies
The closure has a document number. Government Order No. I-050II/6/2014-PE-X, dated 13 January 2016, directed the liquidation, winding up or merger of HMT Watches Limited, HMT Chinar Watches Limited and HMT Bearings Limited. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved it that month, and HMT’s shareholders passed the resolutions by ballot.
The exit terms carry the real story. HMT Watches’ staff were still on 1997 pay scales in 2016, because public-enterprise rules bar pay revision at loss-making state companies. To close the plants the government relaxed its own rule and computed terminal benefits on 2007 notional scales. Nine years of deferred pay revision arrived on the last day, for about 800 people.
The financial case was not disputable. Production value fell from an anticipated ₹62 crore in 2005-06 to ₹0.94 crore in 2015-16, then nil. In 2014-15 the company sold ₹8.13 crore of watches and lost ₹259.20 crore doing it — about ₹32 of loss for every ₹1 sold, on a payroll of 1,005. Accumulated losses reached ₹2,801.08 crore by 31 March 2017. The trade account is simpler: HMT was late to quartz in the 1970s and out-retailed by Titan from 1987.
Then comes the part almost nobody reports. In FY2023-24 the government waived ₹2,693.78 crore of HMT Watches Limited’s liability to it and granted ₹837.47 crore towards the income tax on that waiver. Exceptional income of ₹3,531.25 crore followed, and a profit after tax of ₹2,680.78 crore — for a company with, in its own words, “no operating sales or income as closure activities under process”.
A watchmaker that stopped making watches in 2016 posted its largest ever profit seven years later, funded entirely by the state forgiving what it was owed.
HMT Chinar Watches Limited went into voluntary liquidation and is recorded as dissolved; HMT Bearings Limited was taken up for winding up. HMT Limited itself is active, listed and profitable, with a net profit of ₹16.10 crore in 2024-25.
Buying it in India
For a new watch, hmtwatches.in is the channel this audit can verify. It names HMT Limited, the Auxiliary Business Division address and its GSTIN as the seller, and gives a 15-day replacement window on a watch that arrives damaged, defective or wrong.
The second-hand market is harder. Time+Tide’s assessment is blunt — HMT watches “have been faked to an outrageous degree” — and it names two problems. Some are outright counterfeits. Others are pieced together from random vintage examples, so every part is genuine but the watch as a whole never left a factory. A third category, the redial, is a real HMT case and movement wearing a repainted dial, sometimes in a colour HMT never made.
HMT publishes no authentication guidance — no serial-number check, no dial-code reference, no genuine-product page — so this audit will not invent a tell. Paperwork and channel are the defence, because HMT’s own claim process demands the original bill and the guarantee certificate.
Buy new from HMT’s own shop
It names HMT Limited and its GSTIN as seller — the only channel verified here as the company’s own.
Shop the stock, not the model
All four watches on the premium page were out of stock on 30 August 2026. Fix a budget and a movement type instead.
Settle service before you pay
Ring 080-28385491 and ask where a watch is serviced and for how long it is covered. Neither answer is published.
Trust paperwork over the dial
HMT’s claim process demands the original bill and the guarantee certificate, and repainted dials are documented on this brand. No paperwork, no purchase.
We are not publishing a second-hand price range for HMT, because no marketplace figure we would stand behind was available and a guessed range is worse than none. Set your ceiling from the new price: ₹2,800 buys a current mechanical.
Common questions
Is HMT still making watches in 2026?
Yes, but not the company you are thinking of. HMT Watches Limited has been closed since 2016. The parent, HMT Limited, assembles and sells watches through its Auxiliary Business Division at Jalahalli, reporting ₹9.05 crore of assembly production in 2024-25.
Was HMT a joint venture with Citizen?
No source supports that phrase. The record shows a technical collaboration agreed in 1961: a hundred HMT employees trained inside Citizen’s Tokyo factory for a year, and Citizen engineers spent a year in Bangalore in return. No equity, licence fee or royalty appears anywhere.
Where do I get an HMT serviced, and how long is the warranty?
HMT publishes no service centre list, no service pricing and no warranty duration. The published routes are its Bengaluru number, 080-28385491, and a store locator. Assume you will use an independent watchmaker.
Did HMT’s Srinagar factory belong to HMT Watches Limited?
Not after 2000. Srinagar and a Jammu assembly unit sat inside HMT Chinar Watches Limited, incorporated 4 September 2000 and since dissolved. HMT Watches Limited’s plants were Bangalore, Tumkur and Ranibagh.
How we research and verify brand audits: our methodology.
References
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2024-25 — assembly production of ₹9.05 crore, sales of ₹14.83 crore, net profit ₹16.10 crore, 45 employees at 31 March 2025 and the restated closure
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2023-24 — the ₹2,693.78 crore waiver, the ₹837.47 crore tax grant and exceptional income of ₹3,531.25 crore
- Corporate register record, H.M.T. Limited — incorporation on 7 February 1953, listed status and active standing
- Corporate register record, HMT Watches Limited — incorporation on 9 August 1999 and current status
- Corporate register record, HMT Chinar Watches Limited — incorporation on 4 September 2000 and dissolution
- HMT Watches, About Us — the 1961 Citizen collaboration and the Nehru release
- WorldTempus, 6 August 2012 — the hundred employees sent to Tokyo in July 1961 and the HMT 020 calibre
- Department of Heavy Industry, Annual Report 2002-03 — the 1999 incorporation of HMT Watches Limited and the Srinagar and Jammu units of HMT Chinar Watches Limited
- Department of Heavy Industry, Annual Report 2007-08 — the plants at Bangalore, Tumkur and Ranibagh, and anticipated production values
- HMT Watches, home page and price list — all prices observed on 30 August 2026
- HMT Watches, collections — the current collection names
- HMT Watches, Premium Watches — the four out-of-stock listings on 30 August 2026
- HMT Watches, Warranty Policies — the exclusions, the claims process and the absence of any stated period
- HMT Watches, Contact Us — the Auxiliary Business Division address, GSTIN and the Bengaluru support number
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2016-17 — Government Order No. I-050II/6/2014-PE-X of 13 January 2016 and accumulated losses of ₹2,801.08 crore
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2015-16 — the Cabinet approval and the exit package on 2007 notional pay scales against current 1997 scales
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2014-15 — sales of ₹8.13 crore, a net loss of ₹259.20 crore and 1,005 employees on the rolls
- HMT Limited, Annual Report 2019-20 — the voluntary liquidation of HMT Chinar Watches Limited and the winding up of HMT Bearings Limited
- Time+Tide, 17 August 2024 — counterfeits and watches pieced together from vintage parts, and current movement sourcing
At ₹2,000 to ₹2,800 HMT sells something nobody else in India sells: a hand-wound or automatic watch, assembled in Bengaluru, with no import duty inside the price. Sonata will sell you a better-supported watch for ₹695, but it is quartz. If you want a mechanical movement at this money, HMT is not the best option in the category — it is the category.
What you give up is everything behind the watch: no published warranty period, no service centre list, no service pricing, and a parent with 45 employees in total. A mechanical movement needs opening every few years and HMT says nothing about who will do it. Budget for an independent watchmaker from day one, and treat any second-hand HMT without an original bill as a repainted dial until proved otherwise.
Buy it as a ₹2,500 mechanical watch you will service yourself, not as a warranty-backed purchase — and never as a comeback story, because the company is still closed.
