Maruti plans a diesel WagonR

With the rising fuel prices and escalating interest rates, the sales of petrol vehicles have lost pace. Hatchbacks have always been the biggest contributors to the sales figures, but with the unavailability of a diesel variant; they have faced a slowdown too.

Chevrolet had recently launched the diesel variant of its Beat hatchback, making a statement that diesel hatches are the future of the automobile industry. Maruti, seeing the success of the Beat Diesel has decided to launch a diesel variant of its WagonR hatchback.

The diesel tallboy will be powered by a 3 pot version of the Swift’s 4-cylinder diesel engine, making it around 970 cc. It will whip out 59 PS with meaty torque figures, touching the 150NM mark. Prices of the mini- DDiS are expected to start from 3.99 Lakhs, which is only a bit more than the petrol variant. We hope the diesel variant is unveiled at the 2012 Auto Expo and launched in a couple of months. The Wagon R diesel will be the cheapest diesel available in the market if priced at 3.99 lakhs.

The same diesel engine could also power the Estilo, A-Star and hopefull the Eeco. Maruti is now in a bad shape especially with sales down by more then 50%. The smaller diesel engine could help the company retain the 50% market share the company enjoyed for many years.