If there was an award for the most spied car in India, the upcoming Mahindra World SUV or the W201 would win it hands down. Almost every blog and website has managed to capture images or video of this behemoth at least once. We, at Motoroids have spotted it scores of times, and have managed to click it several times. To Mahindra’s credit, however, they have always kept the vehicle under heavy cladding and even after having spotted it so many times, no website or magazine could quite be sure about what the final product is going to look like.
The World SUV is expected to redefine what we have come to expect of Mahindra’s engineering and aesthetics. The new SUV, from what some of the renderings suggest, seems to have taken cues from the previous generation Land Cruiser Prado, which is a damn good thing, as the SUV used to be one of my personal favourite visually. The new SUV is also going to be laden with modern features, and hopefully some technology as well. Handling and dynamics have not been the strong point of Mahindra vehicles thus far, but the new vehicle is expected to change all that.
In the video, the vehicle seems to have enough space behind the rear window for a pair of benches or loads of jumbo size suitcases. You can also see some details of the headlamp if you stop and pause. The World SUV will most likely be powered by Mahindra’s 2.2-litre turbo diesel, but probably in a different state of tune, producing more power than the Scorpio’s 118PS.
The vehicle has been testing for a very long time on the Indian roads, and it’s not long before we see it being launched. Expect a price tag in the region of Rs 13-15 lakh.
Our heartfelt thanks to Joy Sharma, our Chennai correspondent for the video scoop! Here’s the video