The car is a Euro 5-compliant model with lower Co2 emissions. The car is going to be the replacement for the Alto in export markets. In India the car will be a direct competition to the Hyundai i10.

The price of the Maruti A-Star is a good 10% higher than the i10. The base version of the A-star will be about 3.6lacs.

The new Indica Vista will be available with a 1.2litre petrol engine which is called - Safire. The CRDi version will be called the Quadrajet and is a 1.3 litre engine. There is another variant to this car which is TATA’s own 1.4 litre turbo diesel engine.

The Quadrajet engine is the one manufactured by Maruti Suzuki and is currently used in the Swift and DZire models.

The word we hear from the TATA camp is that no old models will be discontinued for this, and all of them will co-exist with the new Indica Vista.

The Fiat 500 - the much fancied car of 2008 has been launched in India. The two door Fiat new car is to be priced around 15lac ex-showroom Mumbai. The on-road price in India (Mumbai) will be close to 17lac.

This car will not be fancied by the public, but is going to be loved by the rich youth of the country. Celebrities and car lovers would enjoy this car as much as anything.

The Fiat 500 will face stiff competition against the Mini Cooper and the Volkswagen Beetle which is also going to be launched soon in India.

General motors has made it public that they are looking at negotiations seriously with Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. regarding launching the Hummer in India with full fledged availability.

GM had admitted to this in Thailand at the plant opening for production of new cars. There have also been talks of GM selling their Hummer division to the Indian company but that idea seems to be far fetched for the moment. Although there are several automakers in Russia and also China who could be interested in such a deal.

The company has been reporting its worse numbers in their corporate history and is looking to raise capital with the sale of its assets.

Honda Siel, the Indian division has launched the new model for the Civic to keep up with the demand of the ‘Young Indian’. The car is a spin off variant of the Honda Civic and is a limited edition sports car.

The Special edition was launched just as Honda reached the 3 lakh mark in auto car sales in India.

The Honda Civic Sport will come with a 1.8Litre i-Vtec engine and will come with manual transmission. Automatic transmission will not be provided from the company itself. The car was also the highlight of the Auto Expo in Delhi which took place early this year.

“This launch will help broaden our customer base and appeal to the young at heart target audience.” said Mr Masahiro Takedagawa, President & CEO of Honda Siel Cars India Ltd.

If you consider the highest model in the car, there is a price cut of over 55,000 rupees.

“The special price is the result of improved localisation of the Spark coming out of operational efficiencies due to increase in production volume,” said Ankush Arora whos is the Vice president for Marketing India.

The Spark model from General Motors has sold over 2 million units in over 100 countries. The car also won the ‘Best Value 2008′ award for cars this year.

The Hyundai i20 will be a very similar version and will almost resemble the i10 in looks. The only difference is that the Hyundai i20 will run on diesel and not petrol. This will appeal to the customers who have a greater running and want to cut their fuel costs, particularly with rising oil prices.

This year is going to be all about the lower running cost cars with the lauch of the Santro LPG and Accent LPG and CNG versions - which are all due to be launched before December 2008.

The company are focussed on phasing out the old Maruti Esteem and replace it with a re-modelled version of the already hit - Maruti Swift.

The car will be priced at around 5 to 6 lac, but this has not been confirmed by the company. Only estimates i add again. The Swift DZire will have a features that have never been offered in India by any low priced sedans..

A few of these features include -

1. Fully integrated stereo on with steering mounted audio controls.

2. Automatic climate control system,

3. Dual front airbags

4. ABS

Skoda launched the new Skoda Fabia for the Indian market at the Auto Expo in Delhi day before. The car is due to be launched in the next week before the month end. The price is said to be around 4.99 lakhs to 7.6 lakhs which is quite a big range for a small car.

But to say the least, this is no ordinary small car. The luxury of the Skoda is comparable to the top end of any car and we are sure to get a good bang for the buck on this beauty.

The Fabia will be launched with a 1.4 litre petrol and diesel engine at first. Later on in the year the company plans on going in for the 1.2 litre engines. The car will be in the showrooms in 5-6 appealing colors like - Corrida Red, Satin Grey, Brilliant Silver, Magic Black, Candy White and Cappuccino Beige.

TATA has finally unvielled the 1 lakh car at the dealer price level. This works out to about USD 2500. The end customer will be able to buy it for about 20,000 more, so between 1.2 to 1.3 lakh ruppees.

The car itself looks pretty neat and sweet. It measures 3.1 metres in length and 1.6 metres in height. The NANO is about 1.5 metres in width.

The engine of the car is a 623 cc multi point fuel injection petrol eng. The car comes with tubeless tyres which is a good poisitive surprise.

The TATA nano will have a huge advantage over other four wheelers in terms of fuel economy. The reported fuel economy the car will give is about 20 kms/ litre. Also the car is EURO 4 compliant which is great.