Maruti Baleno is one of the best-selling cars in the company lineup, leaving rivals behind and selling more than 2,00,000 units in less than 20 months. It was launched in the festive season of 2015 and made headlines with large number of bookings in just few days.
It has been on long waiting periods due to high demand but recently, a new production facility by Maruti made things easier for the customers. It took Baleno less than one year to cross the 1,00,000 mark while current figures for the car average over 16,000 units a month.
Maruti Baleno entered the top 10 selling cars list in November 2015 for the first time and claimed a nice place for 16 times since that date. The biggest surprise comes when you study the pattern of sale between petrol and diesel powered Baleno.
Out of every 4 cars sold in this period, 3 were equipped with the petrol engine and only 1 carried the diesel engine. The pattern shows increasing interest of Indian buyers in small petrol cars. They even realize that spending extra INR 1.25 lakh for the diesel version is not the right thing in most cases.
One needs to drive a lot in order to get the actual benefits of extra investment on small diesel engines. If this continues the same way, brands may start offering just petrol motors till the premium hatchback segment. Diesel engines are actually more effective on SUVs and large sized sedans as puling their weight is not a good option through a same sized petrol motor.
Baleno has got a price hike of nearly INR 36,700 (top spec model). The first hike was experienced within three months of its launch while March and August saw another two last year. Baleno is powered by three different engine options. The most recent one to make into this list is the RS variant.
Maruti Suzuki recently launched the powerful Baleno RS in India
It comes with a 998cc, three cylinder turbocharged petrol engine producing 101 BHP at 5500 rpm and 150 Nm at 1700-4500 rpm. The engine was even more powerful in the international version but tuned down for the Indian conditions. This car weighs 950 kg and comes with all the goodies of the top spec Alpha variant. The other two engines on offer are 1.2L petrol and 1.3 liter turbo diesel unit. Automatic options is only available on the 1.2L engine.