Mahindra & Mahindra to pump up its petrol game

In a bid to tackle the growing uncertainties surrounding the future of diesel engines in the country, leading utility vehicle manufacturer Mahindra & Mahindra will offer petrol variants on its entire vehicle line-up by the next fiscal (2017-18).

Speaking at the quarterly earnings conference of the company in Mumbai today, Dr Pawan Goenka, executive director, M&M, said: “Any product that we launch from a year after will come with a petrol engine. We are currently working on a 1.5-litre petrol engine. As a result, all our future vehicles will be equipped with either a 1.2-, 1.5- or 2.0-litre engine. After we launch the 1.5-litre engine, we would be as good as any other competitor with a petrol offering in India.”

The carmaker is already working on petrol variants of the XUV500, which is scheduled to be launched in the fag-end of this fiscal along with a petrol variant of the Scorpio, which is set to launch in early part of 2017-18, Goenka said.  The company is said to be investing Rs 1,000 crore for developing its crop of petrol engines.

Mahindra had introduced its first indigenously developed petrol engine with the KUV100 and so far the demand has justified its decision to venture into the petrol territory.

In fact, the demand for petrol variants of the KUV100 has been more than anticipated, Goenka said. As many as 50 percent of buyers have opted for the petrol version of the KUV 100, which was launched in January earlier this year, up from around the company’s expectation of 40 percent.

The Supreme Court’s decision to ban the registration of diesel vehicles with engine capacity over 2,000cc in Delhi-NCR has resulted in a shift in consumer preference to petrol cars. Though Mahindra has already launched a 1.9-litre version of its mHawk diesel engine for the XUV500 and Scorpio in its key market of Delhi-NCR, the growing policy uncertainties have contributed to the decision to offer petrol variants.

Sales of petrol models have picked up drastically since the imposition of restrictions on sales of diesel vehicles in Delhi-NCR, which has historically been the biggest market for such vehicles.

Data revealed by SIAM (Society of Indian Automobile Manufactures) showed that the share of diesels among the total sales of passenger vehicles during April-June 2016-17 declined to 41 percent from 44 percent in the previous year, while the share of petrol vehicles increased to 59 percent from 56 percent.

Now with its upcoming crop of petrol-powered vehicles, the country’s largest UV-maker would look to defend its turf and also add incremental volumes in the future.