Maruti Suzuki to Discontinue Ritz in India This Year: Report

Maruti Suzuki, the country's largest car maker is rumoured to be planning to discontinue its popular hatchback Ritz in India to make way for the company's upcoming YRA. 

A report in ET Auto.com has revealed that Ritz hatchback will be one of the six models that will be axed this year. Although Ritz had been registering decent sales when compared to other models of the company, the hatchback could not meet its expectations.

As we already know, Maruti is setting the stage for its premium hatchback code named YRA. If this rings true, Ritz is likely to be out of the market by May end as the buzz on the Internet suggests that the new hatchback YRA could arrive as early as in May.

When launched, YRA is expected to dislodge Maruti Swift as the expensive hatchback offering by the company at present. 

However, the latest news of Maruti discontinuing its Ritz contradicts previous reports that the company was working on new variants of Ritz, including a taxi variant. It was reported recently that Maruti is readying a facelifted avatar of Ritz to revive its market along with a taxi variant dubbed Ritz Tour.

Speaking of YRA hatchback, the model will compete against the likes of Hyundai Elite i20 and Honda's upcoming Jazz. The car will sit above the company's popular Swift hatchback and will be 90kg lighter than Swift. Other speculated features include steering-mounted controls, new music system with touchscreen, engine start-stop button, electrically adjustable OVRMs and reverse parking sensors.