Maruti Suzuki and Tata Motors will also switch to in-house diesels to meet BS-VI norms.
The popular 1.3-litre Fiat Multijet diesel engine will be discontinued in India as soon as the new Bharat Stage VI (BS-VI) emission regulations kick in after the year 2020.
With Maruti, Fiat’s largest customer for this engine, and Tata Motors, both deciding to use in-house-developed BS-VI diesel engines, Fiat’s engine won’t have any takers. Parent company, Fiat-Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) is contemplating axing the Fiat brand entirely in India and instead will concentrate its resources on ensuring Jeep is a success. Currently, the company sells under 6,000 units a year, and the cost of upgrading the engine to BSVI can’t be justified. “After we lost Maruti and Tata as a customer, we knew that would spell the end of this engine,” said a company source.
While the next-gen Swift, which will launch in March 2018, will be fitted with a 1.3-litre Multijet from the new Dzire, starting with the next-gen Ciaz, all Maruti diesel cars will be powered by an all-new, 1.5-litre, four-cylinder Suzuki engine.
Tata Motors is planning to introduce in-house diesels like the 1.05-litre, three-cylinder Revotorq and more recently, the 1.5-litre, four-cylinder Revotorq diesel, which powers the Nexon. Again, Tata’s new range won’t be powered by the Multijet engine.
This transition marks the end of an era – Fiat managed to sell over 3 million units 1248cc common-rail turbo-diesel. The engines are reliable and frugal and it powered 24 different cars for five different carmakers.
