Ok what do we know so far about the Premier Rio?

• A SUV for just under 6lakhs
• A new niche in the Indian market
• Good valve for money

Or is it?

Premier is trying to pull up a big hollow trick in India with the words SUV and 6lakhs. Rio is construed as a raw diamond but what it actually is, is another black rock! Let me explain why.

If you keep asking the wrong question you won’t get the right answer, likewise if you compare the Rio to a SUV you won’t get the trick but compare it to a Premium hatchback and that’s when reality strikes you hard on the head.

In India a SUV is not a SUV unless it has 3rd row seating and the Rio doesn’t and it doesn’t have off-roading capabilities either. So what you get for your 6Lakh is a car which looks big from outside like an SUV but has the same seating capacity of any premium hatchbacks.

The hatch backs of today are light years ahead of the Rio with their technology and features. The one advantage Rio has over the hatches is a little more boot space but for that the leg room is compromised big time, mind it the “SUV” is just 4meters long to enjoy tax benefits.

Rio has a whole new level of cheapness going on which you have to see to believe. It feels nostalgic in a bad way; it’s like using a mobile phone the size of a cigarette carton in the IPhone age. The Rio is no de Janeiro it’s just degenerate. Even after all this if you are buying one, you would have to be a horse wearing winkers.

Premier LTD which now may not even be recognized was not long back ago one of just two carmakers in India. It was quite famous for its Padmini model back in the day. Since the glory Padmini days Premier has had a rough ride and it is trying to make a comeback with a new niche, a mini SUV for 5-6Lakhs.

The Completely Knocked Down (CKD) parts are shipped in from china to Premier’s assembly plant in Pune which has an assembling capacity of 500 Rios every month. The car will hit the 30 Premier showrooms by the end of the year and the Premier dealership network is aiming to increase the number to a 100 by next April.

The Rio has a 1.5 litre Peugeot engine, Premiers ex-partner. Premier claims to have fiddled with the engine to update it. Maximum power output is 65bhp with a torque of 140Nm both just quite enough to move the car. The engine is mated to a 5-speed gearbox. The suspension on the front is a Macpherson strut with coil springs on the rear no bouncy leaf spring non-sense. The top end LX variants get Alloys and ABS

Rio comes in three variants:

EX – Rs. 5.25 Lakh
DX – Rs. 5.5 Lakh
LX – Rs. 5.9 Lakh

All prices ex-showroom Pune.

Brochure:

Image Gallery:

As we reported earlier Premier Autos are coming up with a mini SUV called Rio and now Premier has announced the launch date as the 28th of this month. With this launch the brand comes back to life again in India with the help of its Chinese counterpart Zoyte. Zoyte will be shipping Completely Knocked Down (CKD) parts from China which will be put together at Premier’s Mumbai based Chinchwad plant near Pune.

The launch is rather important and will be watched by SUV makers in India as the Rio is expected to be a steep dip regarding its Price perspective. If the Rio finds success it will open a flood gate of Chinese car makers to lunge down into the Indian auto scene.

Read our previous entry on the story here to know more.

Remember Premier auto? One of India’s oldest car makers with the cult Padmini model they are trying for a come back next year with an old SUV model from a Chinese auto firm called Zotye Auto. That’s right old and Chinese that ought to do it but lets give this one a try before we completely reject it,

Zotye has an SUV model called Zotye 2008, which is based on Toyota owned Daihatsu’s Terios. The car is expected to be named Premier Rio for India. The selling point of this car would be its price and the new niche it will create in India, the Mini SUV segment. The Xylos and the Sumo Grandes all have engines twice the size of the Zotye 2008’s engine which is a 4-cylinder Mitsubishi engine with a capacity of 1.3L and a torque of 108 Nm.

On a similar note the Toyota Qualis which was a 1986 model and two generations old when it was launched in India in 2000. It recorded the most sales when it was phased out in 2004. But it’s anyone’s guess that Zotye Auto will face serious troubles as it is no Qualis and this is no 2000 for SUVs in India.