The money spent by a B/entry -C segment buyer in India might buy him a lot of VFM, but not world class safety.
Recently a friend of mine lost his beloved father when their Santro collided head-on with a truck on their way from B'lore to Mysore. We all blamed the truck driver. No one thought of going legal against Hyundai for selling cars which are not safe enough.
I guess, we, the Indian car buyers, need to ask for more VFM of which safety has to be an integral part. Most of the models sold in India has their European counter parts selling with airbags, at almost the same price. ( including City Rover..eeeks, Tata Indica).
Hey Tatas, Maruti, and Hyundai's, are you listening....we do not deserve to die just because we paid thru our nose to get a car from you ( and we live in a third world country :-).
We still keep praising these cars because we simply do not realise that, tomorrow, God forbid, my family could be in the situation of losing their dear one.
Or should I blame it on the human nature....we never expect the worst to happen to us and our beloved ones :-)
Anyways, I was supposed to talk a bit on Hyundai Getz.
Getz on the other hand is a bit of an exception. It is one of the very few B and entry level C-segment cars available in India to have gone for EuroNCAP safety test.
As far as I know, Accent and Baleno are the other ones. Both got a rating of one star and were noted with one more ''struck star'' which carries a very special meaning...they could caused fatal injury in case of frontal full and offset collisions.
Getz stood a world apart in the NCAP tests. Gets 4 stars out of five !!
The child, driver and passenger safety ratings were way better than most contemporary super mini's in Europe. In fact, lot of times, they were way better than lot of notch'es around. Though this test was with airbags ( driver and passenger), but structural integrity was one the prime factors of judging
the safety rating, which, fortunately does not change in India.
Being a car launched in the European world, where quality an safety rules are more stringent than most parts of the world ( including US), Hyundai had to do a decent job.
Let us shift our focus to reliability of this car.
Which magazine has recently rated Getz as the most reliable super mini( 0 break down reported among the samples)?
From ''problems per car '' reports perspective, Getz 1.3 manual seems to score very well ( problems per car numbers well below most of Honda's and Toyota's).
But mind you, Indian conditions could be a different ball game altogether.
So far so good....
Not to mention that the car has received the numerous awards across the globe including ''best budget car of the year 03'' in UK and ''car of the year'' awards in Australia.
Coming to practicality of this car....
For the benefit of skeptics, this is not a bigger Santro (for ex. width of a Santro is1525 mm, Zen is 1495 mm, Getz is 1665 mm) . This is a heavier and safer car with much more refined and roomy interiors and exterior ( pls refer to review by Overdrive).
I would request anybody comparing this car with the usual B-segment ones, to go to Hyundai's site and do a comparison. In fact Getz ( 1665 mm wide )seems to have more shoulder room than Ikon flair(1635 mm). Accent is just 5 mm wider then Getz.
Why should I spend 5+laks on a HB ( I am looking at the GL)?
I am looking at the following parameters:
-safe car
-a reliable car
-a car which can seat 5 people comfortably
-good service network and after sales service
-reasonable resale value
Reason why I am ruling Esteem out....unsafe, dated looks, and Maruti is awfully cheap. Their cost saving goes to the extent of not having a vanity mirror as a standard fittment in Lxi. Even more amazing is power windows for front only and no central locking for 5 laks onroad price. And 870 kg of body weight for a 3 box sedan .... give me a break !!!
Ford Ikon flair seems to have most of what I would look for( a bit costlier than Getz GL) but this car has started showing wrinkles. Moreover it has been reported to be costlier on maintenance and Hyundai definitely has a better service network.
And oh yes ,... Getz being a newer model with nice build
quality, one can expect a bit more of the resale value than Fords
Who could forget that ''snob value'' of a 3 box sedan ?
Well, current Getz owners you could always boast about your car being the official car of Athens Olympics, 04. Not to mention the numerous awards Getz won. It is also regarded as one of the hottest selling Supermini's in Europe. I bet, people will buy more Getz it it sprouts a boot tomorrow.
Please note that I have been talking from the point of view of a B-segment buyer ready to stretch his budget a bit and has the option of Getz ( call it a premium HB or a Supermini) and the likes of Esteem and Ikon flair. I have not been able to gather enough wisdom to understand why an existing C-segment buyer, who could afford a Honda City would fall for Getz.
I definitely mean no hurt feelings to the owners of the other cars refered to in my
review..... everybody has their own set of priorities. This is my prespective... thoughts are welcome...
