Recently, a friend of mine asked me to recommend a decent city car for her. ‘A good-looking, easy to drive car with an automatic gearbox and lots of space on the inside’ was the brief I received. And with her budget lurking around the Rs. 5 lakh mark, I had only a few cars to suggest to her, of which none I actually ‘liked’.
Voila! Renault India, one manufacturer that has actually cracked the small car segment after Maruti and Hyundai, announced the launch of the Kwid AMT. Should I or rather would I recommended this car to her? We’ll get there.
All-new?
No. Except the 5-speed gearbox, (developed in-house by Renault India, in collaboration with Bosch), absolutely zilch. But it has made a lot of difference to the overall package, for sure. The urban junta is all gung-ho for the latest ‘fad’ of automatic gearboxes that offer a lot of convenience over the manual ones, as we approach apocalyptic traffic snarls.
And on the inside there’s a unique rotor based gear selector placed on the dashboard, that gives way to truckloads of cubby holes, making it an even more practical car than earlier. Everything else is left untouched.
Will it turn heads?
If you’re familiar with the recently launched 1-litre variant of the Kwid, you won’t find anything particular to look for. Everything remains as it is, except the Easy-R badge on the boot. And yes, the Kwid is a pretty handsome hatch; I won’t be exaggerating if I say that it’s one of the most good looking hatchs in India, right now.
Fun to drive?
The Kwid has already set benchmark in its class when it comes to the ride and handling setup, and with no mechanical changes being made to the AMT variant, the dominance will be carried forward. The ride is flat at high speeds and the tiny hatch that comes with equally tiny wheels, holds it well even on bad roads. Only issue I had is the lack of seat height adjustment, as I couldn’t find a good position for myself, and I’m on the healthy side and almost 6 feet tall.
Now, for the AMT ‘box then. The 5-speed unit developed in-house by Renault is one of the best AMT units we have tried in recent times, hands down. It even betters the 6-speed unit which it’s elder sibling Duster gets. The ‘head banging’ is kept to a minimum and the ratios are well proportioned. The ‘box is quick at downshifting and is pretty easy to get used to, once you are on the move. We drove it hardly for a distance of over 50km and got accustomed to the style by the end of the drive. One odd feature of the auto box is the manual acceleration that needs to be applied, unlike on the regular AMTs, when the car gets going without being accelerated. Renault claims that it has been thoughtfully laid out for amateur auto ‘box drivers.
Good value?
Absolutely yes. The Kwid not only gets a host of features that are missing on cars a segment above, but is also more spacious. Even the fuel efficiency figure hovered above 14kmpl through out the drive, and obviously, it was driven in a spirited manner. Renault suggests that the pricing will be extremely aggressive and that means, the Alto K10 and even the Tata Nano have a lot to worry about.
Verdict:
Today, Renault is one of the very few manufacturers in India who are getting it absolutely spot-on with their strategy. The Kwid has been a massive success for the French carmaker and the Kwid AMT is all set to be a game changer in its segment. With one of the best-in-class packages, when it comes to space, features and driving dynamics, the AMT is only expected to take it higher up the mountain of sales. Yes, Renault could’ve offered the option of a passenger airbag and ABS at least now, but maybe they are going to equip the Kwid 2.0 with it, next year. And yes, my ‘friend’ is going to move to the ‘best friend’ zone soon, as I’m sure that the Kwid AMT is now the perfect car that I could always have recommended.
evo India rating:
4/5