Official word is finally out that popular Indian CV maker Ashok Leyland will launch the Stile MPV on October 8. It may be noted that the Stile certainly took quite some time coming to us. Ashok Leyland unveiled the Stile MPV prototype back at the 2012 Indian Auto Expo and it has taken the manufacturer almost a couple of years to reach the launch-stage.
The Stile is basically a re-badged Evalia and as with most of such products, Ashok Leyland seems to have taken enough measures to differentiate the upcoming vehicle from its donor car. This should help the Stile carve out a niche for itself in the fast developing MPV segment of our car market.
Ashok Leyland Stile is targeted at the commercial van segment and unlike the Evalia, doesn’t have high hopes from private car buyers.
The Stile MPV will be built by Nissan, alongside the Evalia, at the Renault-Nissan joint manufacturing facility at Oragadam, off Chennai. The Stile will come with the same 1.5 liter K9K turbo diesel engine that powers the Evalia but will have a lesser power output of 74 Bhp. The engine is mated to a five speed manual gearbox. The Stile is lighter than the Evalia by 43 kgs and hence, expect a slightly higher claimed fuel efficiency figure of 19.5 Kmpl (vs the Evalia’s 19.3 Kmpl).
The Stile won’t get a stereo unit and passenger side power window switch. Also, it will miss out on Central locking, keyless entry (with the push button start), fog lamps and real time fuel consumption display have been given by a miss.
The Stile will be sold in 3 variants: Base, LS and LX.
The Base variant is an 8 seater model, and the LS and LX variants can be configured with captain seats on the second row, and are 7 seaters. The Stile gets sliding windows, covered glove box and an AC blower for the second row.
Stay tuned to Motoroids for details of Ashok Leyland Stile.