Indian drivers honk incessantly. It’s widely believed that driving there without honking frequently is unsafe, because concepts like lanes and signaling are… loosely followed, to put it mildly. Honking in North America or Europe either means an emergency or someone is pissed off. Honking in India means hello I am here.
As swalling said, honking in India is constant. A horn in a US bound car may be activated 100 times a year, if the driver is a real jerk. A horn in India will be activated 100 times a day easy. You need a much more robust horn (and horn switch) or it'll wear out quickly; but there's no need for such a robust horn in the US.
The last time I owned a car was 1997. By that time, I had 9 years' experience driving and I'd racked up a significant mileage as well. My first car was a Corolla where I could barely get to the horn, because it was a 2-inch button on the wheel. I can't remember exactly the configuration of the Integra's horn, but when I had that final, fateful accident, I made a really valiant attempt to honk at my assailant just before I cracked up, and completely failed to get any sound out of it. That was how infrequently I honked, and how inexperienced I was at activating that part of the car's controls!
It would be interesting to see if there is a correlation between the number of honks per driver and the number of accidents they are in involved in. But I doubt the onboard computer collects "num_honks: integer"
