New Delhi: India’s biggest auto carnival — the 13th edition of Auto Expo in February — will witness a record 80 new launches. Jeep, Italian motorcycle brand Benelli, Indian Motorcycles, and two-wheeler brand Polaris will be participating for the first time in the expo.
Maruti Suzuki, Mahindra, Hyundai Motor India, Honda Cars India, Tata Motors, Audi and Mercedes-Benz among others will also show off their product line up. In the previous edition of the expo in 2014, around 70 products were launched. It is expected that around seven lakh people will visit the Auto Expo this time as against 5.6 lakh people during the last edition in 2014. There will be 65 exhibitors participating in the expo against 55 last time.
With the world focusing on preventing climate change, the upcoming Auto Expo will lay special thrust will be on electric and hybrid vehicles. The Supreme Court order banning the sale of 2000cc diesel-run vehicles and the government’s decision to upgrade to less polluting BS6 norms by 2020 have put auto makers in a difficult situation.
Automakers association SIAM president Vinod K. Dasari said that making engine compliant with BS6 norms by 2020 will be a challenge and industry will do its best to meet it,” a technology that doesn’t exists today.” But he can’t say for sure whether companies will be successful or not. “In other countries moving from BS4 to BS6 has taken 10-12 years and Indian automakers are being asked to do the same in around four years,” he explained.
He claimed that it was not possible to simply import technology from US and Europe as Indian conditions were different. On the ban over 2000cc diesel vehicles, the SIAM president said: “If you want to stop pollution please stop most polluting vehicle, not the vehicle which meets the norms.”
