India's First Honda Civic Type-R Is Here
The performance car culture in India has been improving over the decades. We now have several exotic car brands like Lamborghini, McLaren and even Ferrari opening their dealerships in India. These cars are slowly becoming a common sight on the roads in many major cities. However, there are people who often like to try different things or stand out from the crowd. This reflects in their cars as well. Here, we have one such person who just imported a very unique-looking performance car - a Honda Civic Type-R.
The Honda Civic was once offered officially in the Indian market. Sadly, the car never found a lot of buyers due to various reasons including the pricing. The car was later discontinued too. While we got the regular version, internationally Honda used to sell the performance-oriented version of the same 4-door sedan as the Type-R.
The car seen here in the pictures gets red temporary registration with MH plates. This is a sign that the car was probably brought to India for registration purposes. There were rumours initially that Honda is testing the performance sedan in India but it looks like that is not the case.
We now have information that the car was actually imported by a customer in India, as many have done in the past. The Honda Civic Type-R was imported from Japan and we have images of the infotainment system of the same car that prove this.
The car is finished in an all-white shade with black elements on the grille and ORVMs. This Civic Type-R is based on the 11th-generation model and it does look extremely sporty in this shade.
We see a sleek hood scoop on the bonnet, the Type-R-specific bumper with a large air dam, and a blacked-out front grille. The front headlamps are integrated in such a way that they look like a part of the grille. We see the Type-R badge on the grille and we also have air curtains on the bumper too.
Coming to the side profile, the design looks similar to the regular Civic that was last available in the Indian market. The coupe-like design adds to the sporty character along with the 19-inch blacked-out alloy wheels. As we move to the rear, we see a large spoiler mounted on the tail and we also see the triple exhaust setup along with a diffuser on the rear bumper.
We also have interior images of the car. The owner has opted for racing seats finished in a red shade. It also gets black elements on the dashboard. Like most Honda cars, the Civic Type-R offers a combination of both performance and everyday practicality. It gets features like a touchscreen infotainment system, digital instrument cluster, blind spot monitoring system, and so on.
The Civic Type-R is powered by a 2.0-litre turbocharged petrol engine that generates 315 Bhp and 420 Nm of peak torque. The engine is mated to a 6-speed manual gearbox. Honda has mentioned that this is the most powerful VTEC turbo engine to be fitted in a Type-R.
Honda has plans to launch a few CBUs in the Indian market and they are considering a few models as part of the same. This includes their hybrid sports coupe Prelude. Whether the Civic or Civic Type-R will be a part of this plan is something that we have to wait and watch. A brand-new Civic Type-R has a starting price of around 5.5 million yen. This roughly translates to around ₹31.5 lakh. This means the owner would have easily spent close to a crore or even more to get this car imported to India.