Maruti Ciaz bookings cross the 6,000 mark, launch in 1st week of October

Demand for the Maruti Ciaz is picking momentum despite the car not being available for display at showrooms. Maruti has received over 6,000 bookings for their new C-segment entrant and going by the response, the carmaker has preponed its launch from Mid-October to the first week of October to cash in on the festive season. It isn’t clear yet on the split between the petrol and diesel models but going by what dealers tell us, the numbers will be tilted heavily towards the Multijet diesel equipped Ciaz. The Petrol Automatic Ciaz too is finding quite a few takers, the reason being the Automatic’s ARAI certified mileage figure of 19.12kmpl according to dealers we spoke to. This makes the Ciaz the most efficient automatic in its segment. Maruti dealerships are accepting bookings at Rs 21,000 which is refundable just in case you don’t like the car once you see it in the flesh and drive it.

The Maruti Ciaz replaces the SX4 in the C-segment and takes on the Honda City and Hyundai Verna. Unlike the SX4, the Ciaz is more upmarket and comes with a lot more features this time round. These include projector headlamps, smartly designed 16 inch alloy wheels (15 inchers on lower spec variants), a touchscreen entertainment system that doubles up as a display for the rear parking camera, climate control, ABS and two airbags, rear AC vents, Bluetooth phone connectivity, push button stop-start system and more.

The Ciaz features the two engines from the Ertiga – the 1.4-litre K-series petrol engine developing 92PS/130Nm and the 1.3-litre Fiat sourced Multijet unit with 90PS/200Nm output. It falls short on power and torque against its competition but Maruti is playing the economy card here. The petrol Ciaz has an ARAI certified mileage of 20.7kmpl and the diesel posts 26.2kmpl making it the most efficient diesel car in India, at least on paper. Maruti has remapped the ECU for better throttle response in the petrol Ciaz compared to the Ertiga. 

The Maruti Ciaz comes with five speed manual gearboxes for the petrol and the diesel and a torque convertor automatic gearbox for the petrol. There’s no AMT for the Ciaz like Maruti has for the Celerio. Maruti has also introduced new trims with the Ciaz called the ZXI+ and ZDI+. Expect Maruti to comfortably undercut its rivals in terms of pricing.