The maker of the Brezza SUV had earlier kept the door open for the diesel powertrain for mid-size vehicles, though it had stopped producing small diesel-run cars. But the shift of consumer preference towards petrol has triggered the company to finally bid adieu to diesel.
A project to develop a 1.5-litre diesel engine for the Indian market has also been cancelled.
Maruti Suzuki hopes to sell more than half a million CNG vehicles in the local market in the next two to three years amid a sharp rise in petrol and diesel prices. CNG is expected to account for a fourth of its total sales in India by the fiscal year ending March 2024, said people in the know of the company’s plans. Including hybrids and flex fuel, close to a third of its total production will run on greener fuels, helping the company meet future Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) regulations, they said.
An email sent to the Indian unit of Japan’s Suzuki Motor seeking comment did not elicit any response till the time of going to press Thursday.
“The government as well as the company, in accordance with Suzuki’s plan, is going ahead with pushing CNG vehicles to the maximum extent,” Maruti Suzuki chairman RC Bhargava had said recently. “Production of CNG vehicles is increasing rapidly. And this year, demand has been more than our expectation,” he had said, while projecting the production target for next fiscal year starting April 2022 to be 350,000-400,000 CNG vehicles.
The automaker is looking at selling 250,000 units of CNG-powered vehicles in the ongoing fiscal 2022. Given a marked shift in consumer preference amid a sharp rise in conventional fuel prices, sales of CNG vehicles are expected to overtake those of diesel-driven ones in the local market, post the shift to CAFE2 norms.
