The Indian automobile market currently is going through an upheaval caused by the Coronavirus outbreak. 2019 couldn’t be termed a good year for the industry with a decline in sales being a major talking point. Automobile brands are striving to refresh their product line up to cater to new consumer demands. Toyota Kirloskar Motors is bringing a CNG variant of Yaris in the Indian market. Toyota introduced Yaris a couple of years ago but hasn’t garnered success among the Indian consumer.
Toyota plans to carve a niche in the sedan category with the launch of taxi specific variants. With the new BS6 Emission Norms coming into force from 24 April 2020, Japanese Automaker is planning ahead with the CNG fitted Toyota Yaris. Toyota will add the CNG variant to its already existing petrol model in the coming months. With Coronavirus shutting down production units and scuppering any probable launches, we can expect Toyota Kirloskar Motors to launch CNG Yaris around the festive season.
As of now, the Toyota Yaris petrol variant is powered by BS6 compliant Dual VVT-i, 1496cc petrol engine churning out 105.5 bhp of maximum power output and 140 Nm of peak torque. It comes equipped with a 6-speed manual and an 7-speed automatic CVT-i transmission. Toyota Yaris offers Anti Lock Braking System (ABS), EBD and BA for better traction on the Indian roads. As per the mileage, information on the Toyota website states that the manual versions provides a figure of 17.1 Kmpl.
Taxi-hailing operators prefer sedans for their fleet but the discontinuation of Etios, left Toyota with just one sedan in their product portfolio. By launching a CNG variant of Yaris, Toyota is gearing to attract taxi operators in India. The CNG variant would be just coming with a manual transmission in order to keep the prices low. Currently, Toyota Yaris manual variant starts at Rs 8,76,000 (ex-showroom) Delhi.
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