Maruti Suzuki's New Grand Vitara Ad Mocks Diesel: Internet Divided
Maruti Suzuki has been the long-standing leader in India's passenger car space. In the past few years, they have been trying their best to penetrate into higher segments. Maruti Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) sells rebadged versions of the Toyota Hyryder and Innova Hycross as the Grand Vitara and Invicto here. A recent newspaper ad of the Grand Vitara (GV) that takes a dig at diesel cars is now making much noise online.
The newspaper advertisement reads 'Diesel can't go the distance. Upgrade from diesel to the Grand Vitara strong hybrid and get the unbelievable range'. Clearly, it intends to promote the GV strong hybrid. The fact that it spoke against diesels to do so, triggered netizens. The creative, when shared on X (previously Twitter), sparked active discussions.
It is clear from the comments that not everyone approves of or is happy with ditching diesel engines completely. Many comments criticised the manufacturer to not have catered to the BS6 diesel demands properly. '"Diesel can't go the distance"? Who wrote this? Gadkari?' reads a comment.
Some comments also criticised the company for the safety offered by its products. This, however, may not hold true in modern times. The recent launches from Maruti Suzuki are known to offer heightened safety and crashworthiness. However, there are also comments that approve the advertisement and its line.
Maruti Suzuki Pulling The Plug On Diesel In India: More About It
For the uninitiated, Maruti Suzuki used to offer frugal diesel engines (1.3L Multijet diesel) back in the day, which were sourced from FCA (now Stellantis).
In April 2020, at the time when India was making its transition to BS6, Maruti Suzuki announced its (shocking) decision to discontinue diesel cars and shift the focus completely to petrol, hybrids, CNG and other alternate fuels. This had upset many back then.
This meant that the carmaker would soon axe the in-house developed 1.5-liter diesel engine (DDiS 225), which was originally slated for use in the Ciaz, Ertiga and several other models. This engine was originally introduced as a BS4 unit, but was later upgraded to comply with the BS6 norms.
Somehow, Maruti Suzuki found it to be a better financial decision to make a complete shift to petrol, CNG and other 'greener' fuels and work on improving the fuel efficiency.
Maruti's Rising Foothold In The Hybrid Market
Fast forward to the present day, and we see that MSIL has made significant progress in making fuel-efficient petrol and strong hybrid cars. It is now one of the few manufacturers to have a presence in India's growing strong hybrid space- thanks to a joint venture with Toyota. Toyota holds a wealth of experience in designing and building hybrid cars and SUVs. Selling rebadged versions of hybrid Toyota's was indeed Maruti's easy ticket to the segment.
The Grand Vitara was launched in September 2022, and the carmaker has already achieved cumulative sales of over 3 lakh units. The strong hybrid variants have been in good demand. In the financial year 2024-25 alone, it registered a Year-on-Year (YoY) growth of over 43 per cent. There is thus a steady demand for this powertrain in the Indian market.
In the time ahead, the carmaker has plans of betting big on hybrids. They are known to be working on affordable Series hybrid versions of models like Fronx, Baleno and Swift. These could be out in the upcoming years, when the hybrid space opens up further.