'Maruti Celerio's pricing cannot be compared with others'

The pricing of competitor products is not an issue for Maruti Suzuki India Ltd's new offering Celerio as it cannot be compared with others, a senior official of the company said here Friday.

He said auto-gear shift models will become a major segment in the country in the years to come.

Maruti Suzuki's new hatchback Celerio with manual transmission is priced at around Rs.4.01 lakh here and its auto-gear shift is priced at Rs.4.41 lakh.

Queried about Nissan Motor India's plans of launching its hatchback Datsun Go below Rs.4 lakh, Manohar Bhat, vice president, Marketing at Maruti Suzuki said: "Both the models are not comparable."

He said Celerio offers more than what other models do.

Bhat said that with Celerio, the company has largely bridged the pricing gap between manual and auto-gear shift models.

Whether the auto-gear shift model would do what Kinetic Honda (gearless scooter) did to the scooter market decades back, Bhat said: "In 1990s, cars with factory-fitted air conditioners was an option, but later it became the in-thing. Later, power steering was optional but now all vehicles come with power steering."

Similarly, auto-gear shift vehicles would become the norm in course of time in the Indian market, he said.

He said Celerio's mileage for both the variants is at 23.1 kilometre per litre.