Petrol XUV500 & Scorpio will widen Mahindra’s base…
The folks at Mahindra have just announced their last quarter’s earnings. While they sold 15 per cent more vehicles on a year on year basis, the future doesn’t look too bright for them due to the black clouds hanging on diesel technology in India. To counter this Supreme Court judgement (which banned vehicles with 2.0L and bigger engines), the company brought a 1.99 litre version of their 2.2 litre mHawk diesel mill.
In a recent press conference, Mr Pawan Goenka, Executive Director and President, Mahindra, told Hindu Business Line that they will be bringing petrol variants of Scorpio and XUV500 this year. Now that will be one interesting move! All these years Mahindra had been building its research and development base on diesel.
However, Supreme Court ban on registration of diesel engines displacing more than 2.0 litre in the NCR has badly shaken up not just Mahindra but the whole industry. Recent talks about NGT further suggesting a ban to be extended to 11 more cities is a reason for further concern. The Government too in the last budget had increased the tax load on new diesel vehicles.
Mr Goenka added:
“This is an area the industry is very concerned and the sector is pursuing its case. Considering the wide ban we are not in a position to revise our growth estimates. Going forward, because of the various forces at work, we will not be able to stay focused on diesel.”
The report also adds the company is also planning to introduce petrol and diesel variants of its entire line-up in the next two years which will be followed by hybrid technology! Mahindra however, would not be introducing any new platforms this year.
