Mangaluru : A 48-year-old Chandrashekar Gowda’s who losses his land, makes his four-wheeled automobile as home for the past 18 years.

The car has been parked on the edge of a forest in Aranthodu, from which he sources raw material for the baskets he weaves, which he sells for subsistence.

Gowda, a driver from Noohalu in Sullia taluk, was reduced to poverty after a cooperative society auctioned his 2.2-acre farm when he failed to repay a loan, in the aftermath of which he turned his car into his home.

Given Gowda’s protracted isolation in his automobile-turned-home, he has become part of the local scenery in Aranthodu, and the district administration in Dakshina Kannada has made efforts to bring him back into the fold.