Swiss watchmakers put faith and language on the dial to woo Indian buyers
As India gains weight on the global stage for Swiss watchmakers, brands are increasingly leaning on cultural resonance to captivate collectors. In just the past week, four limited-edition watches debuted in the country, spanning ₹5.76 lakh to ₹4.25 crore, each featuring motifs designed to resonate strongly with Indian buyers.
Leading the charge is Jacob & Co.’s ₹4.25 crore timepiece: a rose-gold creation depicting Lord Ram, Lord Hanuman, and the Ram Temple at Ayodhya alongside a rotating Earth and flying tourbillon. Only three will be made worldwide. At a different price point, TAG Heuer’s ₹5.76 lakh Carrera features 24 Indian languages on its dial. Franck Muller also unveiled its Vanguard ‘Ram Lalla’,a 108-piece run paying tribute to Lord Ram's childhood form, in partnership with retailer Kapoor Watch Co. Breitling launched a 59-piece, blue-dial Superocean Heritage B31 for ₹8.45 lakh, exclusively with the same retailer.
The flurry of local debuts comes as India becomes more important to Swiss watchmakers. Swiss watch exports to the country rose 28.5% year-on-year to 266.4 million Swiss francs, or about ₹3,050 crore, in January-September 2026, according to the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry FH. India moved to 14th place among the 30 largest export markets, from 20th in 2025, even as demand in some established markets weakened. Export values are not the same as retail sales in India, but the absolute growth could be why brands are paying closer attention to consumers here.
This growth momentum is also getting a push from evolving trade policy. Under the India-EFTA trade agreement, customs duties on qualifying Swiss-origin luxury watches dropped to 15.71% from 18.9% when the pact took effect in October 2025. While the 18% IGST continues to apply, these tariffs are scheduled to phase down progressively to zero by January 2031, which is expected to gradually narrow the price gap between international and domestic retail prices.
Ashok Goel, chairman and managing director of Luxury Time Limited—a distributor representing brands like TAG Heuer, Zenith, Hublot, and Bomberg in India—views special-edition timepieces as a strategic effort to stand out as global watchmakers increasingly target the market. “Sales (of these pieces) will happen automatically; it’s just a question of reinforcement through differentiation,” he said. With more desirable brands becoming available here, he said, watchmakers are looking for ways to make their products distinctive. One way is to appeal to the heart, whether through religious imagery, history or other cultural references.
Beyond the logo
That shift marks a departure from simply bringing global designs to India and expecting the logo to do all the work. TAG Heuer’s Carrera “Echoes of One India”, a 250-piece limited edition featuring national flag colours and hour markers rendered in multiple Indian scripts, exemplifies the new approach. By embedding linguistic diversity directly onto the dial, the watch turns linguistic diversity into an instantly recognizable statement on the wrist, rather than a story confined to a marketing campaign. The brand, which had been planning an India-specific timepiece for years, said early interest was encouraging, though it did not disclose sales figures.
“India is a very important strategic market for us and we have been planning to create a limited edition for India for some years now. When we saw this unique concept, we felt confident of creating a TAG Heuer Carrera watch that can be an ideal tribute for India as it delivers the entire length and breadth of India through one unique dial. The interest we have received from limited edition India is already very encouraging and we are sure that India will appreciate it,” Guillaume Boilot, managing director for Middle East, India, Africa and Turkey at TAG Heuer, told Mint.
For Jacob & Co., that concept translates into elaborate mechanical theatre. Its Shri Ramchandra timepiece—listed by Ethos at ₹4.25 crore—features miniature hand-crafted figures of Lord Ram and Lord Hanuman alongside the Ayodhya temple, an orange stone representing the sun, and a blue Earth rotating once every minute. Franck Muller’s ‘Ram Lalla’ similarly highlights an engraved, hand-finished depiction of the deity across its dial. In both cases, the religious iconography is far more than incidental decoration. It serves as the core defining feature distinguishing these pieces from the brands’ standard collections.
‘Supply creates demand’
Pratiek Kapoor, director of 60-year-old family-owned retailer Kapoor Watch Co., notes that while India-specific editions have existed for over a decade, the current scale is unprecedented. Where watchmakers once focused on broad regional releases, they are now tailoring designs specifically for Indian buyers.
“Supply creates demand,” Kapoor said, revealing that 30-40% of bookings for the Franck Muller Ram Lalla edition came before clients had even seen product photos—a sign of how strongly the concept alone resonated. This surge, he added, reflects a market of increasingly sophisticated consumers who closely track watch complications, craftsmanship, and brand hierarchies.
Erol Baliyan, Franck Muller’s CEO for the Middle East, Africa, and India, said that a compelling limited edition edition needs a story rather than mere cosmetic tweaks like changes to the dial colour or design. “We don’t make limited editions simply by changing the colour of a dial. There has to be a story behind them,” he said, noting that some of the brand’s previous India-exclusive runs sold out within a month to six weeks.
Executing these concepts, however, requires time. Goel said that development can take anywhere from six months to three years, depending on complexity, as manufacturing teams source specialized components and navigate custom production runs.