Tata Tiago delivery gets crippled due to high demand for petrol models

The increasing demand for the newly launched Tata Tiago seems to have put dealers across the country in a tough situation. The dealers of Tata are not able to deliver the new Tiago as promised and the extended waiting period of the Tiago has started creating consternation amongst the buyers, forcing many to cancel their booking, International Business Times India has learnt.

According to a report in the Hindu, the deliveries of the Tiago have been affected due to the unexpected response for the petrol variants of the model. Tata Motors was not expecting a huge market for the petrol version and hence was not prepared to meet the demand.

The Tiago, which made its market entry in April, has already garnered over 20,000 bookings and got over 1.4 lakh enquiries. Tata is now said to be preparing to ramp up the production of the petrol Tiago to bring the delivery back to normalcy. The company has already started a second shift at its Gujarat's Sanand plant and is expected to increase the output in the coming days. The supplies are expected to be back on track in eight weeks.

"We are expanding capacity and have gone in for the second shift at Sanand to produce more cars. We are trying to address the bottleneck and in the coming weeks there will be a significant increase in output," the Hindu quoted Guenter Butschek, the Managing Director of Tata Motors, as saying.

The thinning gap between the petrol and diesel prices could be considered one of the reasons for the increasing demand for the petrol models in the country. According to the publication, nearly 70 to 80 percent of the total bookings for the Tiago are for the petrol models.

Offered in both petrol and diesel engine options, the Tiago comes powered by 1.2-litre three-cylinder Revotron petrol and 1.0-litre three-cylinder Revotorq diesel mills. While the petrol mill churns out 83.8bhp of power at 6,000rpm and 114Nm of torque at 3,500rpm, the 1.05- diesel engine produces 69bhp of power 4,000rpm and 140Nm of torque at 1,800-3,000rpm. Both the engines come mated to a five-speed manual gearbox.

At present, the price range of the Tiago starts at Rs. 3.2 lakh for petrol models and Rs. 3.94 lakh for diesel models (ex-showroom Delhi). It was being reported that Tata is considering a hike in the prices of the Tiago models as it is difficult to continue with the introductory prices for a long time.

[1 lakh = 100,000 | 1 crore = 10 million | 100 crore = 1 billion]