Reference Auto

Honda has been going on a price-slashing spree after doing a reality check of the Indian market (but has not brought in a diesel variant yet), and in the latest move, the Japanese car giant has rolled out a new version of the City for Rs 50,000 less than the current model.

The company had taken a realistic view of the Indian market, where customers consider price as a major factor before buying a car.

First Honda had slashed the price of the Jazz, later it whittled down the price of its City in June by a whopping Rs 66,000.

Prices of the latest version of the Honda City will be from Rs 6.99 lakh to Rs 10.22 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi).

The existing City was priced in the range of Rs 7.49 lakh to Rs 9.89 lakh.

The new Honda City has been rolled out with an extra variant called the Corporate, which is an addition to its other existing E, S and V versions.

The Corporate has been priced at Rs 6.99 lakh. The E variant comes for Rs 7.70 lakh, while the S model is at Rs 8.20 lakh. The variant V-MT and V-AT will be in the range of Rs 8.70 lakh to Rs 9.42 lakh.

The new Honda City, which was first rolled out in Thailand two months ago, has an electric sun-roof in the V variant, which will jack up the price for the V-MT to Rs 9.50 lakh and the V-AT to Rs 10.22 lakh.

The new City also has features like cruise control system and turn indicators on the exterior mirrors. Also, the City is now lengthier by 20 mm and both ground clearance and height have been raised by 5 mm.

The new City comes with the option of new bright colours, value-added features, a slight change in looks, 10-spoke alloys, new bumpers, new tail lights, chrome front grille, beige interiors, high-quality fabric and chrome fittings on the inside, among others. In the base variant of the Honda City sedan, there are black interiors.

The new City will come in colour options such as Urban Titanium Metallic, Bold Beige Metallic, Albaster Silver metallic and Taffeta White.

Bookings for the new City have already started at all Honda dealerships across the country and deliveries will start from January. The company had launched the third generation City for the first time in 2008 and has sold 1.36 lakh cars so far.

Owing to a slew of models in the sedan segment, the City has been facing stiff resistance from other cars such as the Hyundai Verna, the Maruti SX4 and the Volkswagen Vento.

It is at a disadvantage with some peers like the Verna, the SX4 and the Vento as these cars come in diesel variants also, unlike the City, which comes in a petrol version only.

Honda’s marketing is still half baked and while a price reduction is a good signal and could bring in customers, not having diesel models of the new City could deter buyers as the segment has a slew of other diesel cars, which could attract customers.