Volkswagen Recalls Vehicles in India

Unless and until that happens, customers in India might not send their vehicles for recalls fearing loss in power and mileage. “If we sell no cars, it will get relatively hard”.

The Group said on Tuesday that cars with EA189 engines sold from 2008 till the end of November 2015 in India would be recalled.

Affected cars have software created to cheat on emissions tests. Audi and Porsche contribute an outsized portion of Volkswagen’s overall profits, and the U.S.is proportionally more important to both than it is to the VW brand.

The world’s number-two automaker faces regulatory and criminal investigations in several countries, including Germany and the United States, and potentially billions of dollars in fines.

The group will first present “the technical released solution to Ministry of Heavy Industries and ARAI”. That was the previous biggest recall in India.

The trigger to the company’s market woes came when it was revealed by the US Environmental Protection Agency that VW rigged almost half a million cars to pass US smog tests.

While there has not been any official word on the technical solution, it is known that the cars in India will be served with the same solution that has been developed for the worldwide models. The rest of the country is covered by BS-III and will move up to the higher standard in April 2017.

Volkswagen’s emissions scandal crushed the brand’s US sales in November, despite heavy discounts and a strong month for the overall auto industry. Once approved by the competent authorities, the respective brands of the Volkswagen Group in India will carry out necessary changes in a step-wise manner. Sales of the cars were suspended by Volkswagen earlier this month after the automaker admitted to installing software on its four-cylinder diesels meant specifically to cheat carbon-dioxide emissions tests. The installation of the flow transformer and the software adjustment to the 1.6-litre engine is expected to take around an hour, while the 2.0-litre engine – that will receive only a software upgrade – will be serviced to make it compatible with emission norms in as little as 30 minutes.

“Technically, they [VW AG] have found a solution to the emissions issue, which is a software update or a little piece of plastic in the inlet side of the engine on the 1.6-litre models”, he said yesterday. However, Indian officials have not verified these claims.