Maruti Celerio Cross: Launching soon in India

The Maruti Suzuki Celerio is facing some stiff competition from Tata Tiago. To add some freshness to the Celerio and to capitalize on Indian car buyers’ fetish for butch cars, Maruti has given it the ‘Cross’ treatment. The car’s already been spotted in an ad shoot, which suggests that it’ll be launched in a few weeks from now, right in time for India’s festive season. We’ve put together renders showing how the Celerio Cross will look like.

What’s the Celerio Cross all about?

It’s a butch version of the popular hatchback. There’s cladding all around, making the car look more masculine. The wheel caps have also been painted black. The front and rear bumpers get inserts. These changes apart, there’s little to differentiate the Celerio Cross from the regular variants.

For now, it’s unclear if Maruti has boosted ground clearance of this hatchback by tweaking the suspension. If so, it’ll be a good move considering the fact that it’s always good to have the best ground clearance possible in Indian conditions.

Under the hood, the Celerio will continue with the tried and tested, 1 liter-3 cylinder K-Series petrol engine with 67 Bhp-90 Nm on tap. This engine will have both 5 speed manual and automated-manual transmissions on offer with the Celerio Cross, just like it does with the regular variants.

Have I seen it before?

Oh yes, you have, at the 2016 Indian Auto Expo, when showed this car as a concept. It’s nearly taken two years for Maruti to put this one into production, but perhaps the facelift comes at the right time, what with the Tiago breathing down the Celerio’s neck.

In August 2017, Maruti dispatched 9,210 units of the Celerio to dealerships across the country while Tata sent out 7,036 Tiagos. Both cars are now locked in battle for small car buyers’ purse strings. The coming months will tell us which way this battle will go. Will the newly Celerio Cross click, or whether the Tiago will manage to convince buyers of its ‘value-buy’ credentials. An interesting battle is in the offing.