Maruti Suzuki Ignis: Is the crossover set to replace Ritz?

There is absolutely no dearth of news about Maruti Suzuki's Ignis in India. Right from speculations on pricing to features, the new crossover from Maruti Suzuki has been making headlines recently. Now, it seems the trend is moving in a new direction.

The latest debate in the auto corridor is whether the upcoming Ignis is a replacement of Maruti Suzuki's Ritz in India. Although the company has not spilled the beans on the same, rumours are rife that Maruti is mulling to stop the production of the Ritz in India to make way for the Ignis compact crossover.

According to a report by Oncars.in, sales of the Ritz are likely to be continued only till the stock lasts. The company is believed to have slowed down the production of Ritz already to accommodate more units of Maruti's hot-selling models like the Vitara Brezza compact SUV and the Baleno premium hatchback. Although Ritz has been registering decent sales, the hatchback could not meet the expectations of the company. Launched in 2009, Ritz has not received any major updates in India.

Now as Ignis gets ready for a launch in the country, it is widely speculated that Maruti would price it in the same range as that of Ritz and the company would be looking to remove some of its slow-selling cars from the line-up to achieve its sales target of 2 million by 2020. The production slow down of Ritz in the country is said to be an indication of this.

Speaking of Ignis, the crossover will the third model to be sold through Nexa dealerships in India and is likely to get a 1.2-litre VTVT petrol engine and a 1.3-litre MultiJet diesel unit. Maruti is also said to be considering 1.0 BoosterJet turbo-petrol engine for the Ignis and could also be available with Automated Manual Transmission (AMT) box.

To be pitted against Mahindra KUV 100, Ignis is expected to get safety features such as dual airbags, ABS with EBD, hill descent control and reverse camera with parking sensor.