The circle comes to a full with Maruti Suzuki recalling it’s A-Star numbering 1 lakh. This follows the last month’s nightmare of Toyota recalling many of its cars numbering 6-8 lakhs in the European market. Maruti’s A-Star hit the head with the snag in the fuel pump gasket. As of now, there has been no official complaint from any customers, but Maruti has started the initiative to do at no cost to the customers. This is just a preventive measure to the cars including those exported.
The industry observers see this as the largest recall in the Indian auto industry. For Maruti this is the second such recall after the hatchback Swift in 2005. That time the flaw was with the bolts to reduce the front suspension noise in Swift petrol; followed in the diesel vehicles in 2007.
Moreover, the company had changed the speedometers in M800 and Omni in two years ago. Regarding this A-Star- a 2008 product equipped with 998cc K10B petrol engine, Maruti has already changed the gasket in 50000 units. Maruti recalled the vehicles which were produced in last August.
Maruti is the next most biggest car maker to recall its vehicles, after Honda recalled 8532 units of City on the defective power window switch.
However, Maruti survived the fall in the stock market. the spokesperson of the Maruti said that the company believes on settling the score of quality and assessment. The snag in A-Star was detected from a complaint received and subsequent enquiries with the owners of A-Star. The cost involving the rectification will be shared along with the supply partner, said the company spokesman.
Maruti exports A-Star to 70 countries and in Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand it is Alto. In the markets of Chile, Angola, Saudi, Morocco, Algeria and UAE it is Suzuki Celerio. The episodes of recall continue since 2007 when Honda recalled 4000 units of CR-V and 2300 units of Accord quoting the product update. In the European market, this car is sold by Nissan as Pixo on a contract basis. Maruti had a good stint with this A-Star in 2009 by exporting 1 lakh cars in December alone. The exporting was made in January 2009 only and it is expected to double – 140000 units in this fiscal.
Consequently the company replaced the design with new fuel tank in CR-V and the upgraded fuel relay in Accord. Right back in 2004-05, Mercedes-Benz had to recall its E-Class in the Indian market for the same reason –upgrading; in 2008 Skoda did so with its Fabia petrol for repairing the fuel deficiency. Tata Motors had to meet the same fate with its then newly launched Indica in 1999.