Volkswagen India begins recall process after ARAI approval

In Dec last year, German automaker announced the largest ever recall in India following a directive from the department of heavy industries

After nine months of wait, Volkswagen India would finally begin the recall process within a month. Almost six months behind schedule, as Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) has approved its first set of plan to fix emission violation. Volkswagen announced the largest ever recall in India in December last year following a directive from the department of heavy industries.

The customers will soon be contacted directly through their respective brand representatives, or their dealers, regarding when they should visit the workshop for the required technical updates.

The company will begin recalling vehicles with the older generation Skoda Superb being first to be fixed. However, the production of the previous generation of the Superb was stopped last year, the car has become the first to be recalled primarily because it is running on the questionable 2.0-litre EA 189 diesel engine.

 

"Volkswagen Group India has received the first approvals for updating the first sets of cars with 2.0-litre and 1.5-litre EA 189 diesel engines and will initiate the activity soon. The customers, whose cars are scheduled in the first phase of updates, will soon be contacted directly through their respective brand representatives, or their dealers, regarding when they should visit the workshop for the required technical updates. All technical updates will be implemented in the vehicles at no cost to the customers. These will be done to be in line with the latest technical updates on the EA 189 diesel engines announced by Volkswagen AG for the European markets," a company spokesperson said.

It has been a year since Volkswagen admitted to fitting millions of cars with cheating software to dupe emissions tests, plunging the German auto giant into one of the biggest scandals ever to hit the industry.

Following the infamous Dieselgate scandal expose, last December, Volkswagen India announced the recall of 323,700 cars across three brands — Volkswagen, Skoda and Audi — for India. Globally the company had to recall 11 million cars.