Mahindra has been working on its upcoming World SUV, codenamed W201 for quite some time now. There are millions of spy pictures of the World SUV test mule doing their rounds in the internet making the upcoming Mahindra SUV a hot favorite for bloggers and social-networkers to discuss.
There have even been some theories being generated on various forums stating that the Dacia Duster is being tested, camouflaged as a Mahindra. But that is false. We at Indian Autos Blog had a tryst with a Mahindra test mule recently. We made quite a number of vital observations of the standing mule from close quarters.
Pawan Goenka, President, Mahindra and Mahindra Automotive sector -
We will be launching the vehicle in the first quarter of FY 12.
The Mahindra W201 would be sold at as a ‘Premium SUV’ and could be priced between Rs.12 to 14 lakhs. As the new SUV is being developed with the international market in mind, we can expect the new Mahindra to come fully loaded and a number of safety features as standard.
The new SUV is said to be a monocoque and that directly implies it will be a very decent handler. Mahindra could also be working on a V6 engine, possibly petrol, the presence of twin-exhaust pipes justify this speculation. But one extremely inquisitive IAB reader had a chance to look under a Mahindra World SUV mule and found two exhaust pipes running all the way from the engine to the rear. This is clearly a sign of a V6 under the hood.
From what we could make out from the test mule, we expect the car to be handsome with lots of design cues borrowed from the Jeep Cherokee.
Click here for IAB’s exclusive rendering of the Mahindra World SUV.
Quote source: NDTV Profit
[...] SUV’s base model to be priced under 10 lakhs so that it could compete with SUVs like the upcoming Mahindra World SUV, the Scorpio, Tata Safari as well as utility vehicles like the Toyota Innova and the to-be-launched [...]