10 months ago
40
Published: Wednesday, June 21, 2023, 16:52 [IST]
Kia India finally pulled the plug on the Kia Carnival MPV in India. Furthermore, the South Korean automaker also removed the model from its official India website and the company is no longer accepting any bookings for the model in the country.
Speaking about the Kia Carnival, the MPV used to be the flagship offering from Kia India until the arrival of the Kia EV6 electric crossover. Furthermore, the Kia Carnival was positioned as a premium MPV in India with no direct rivals.
Speaking about rivals, the closest competitor to the Kia Carnival MPV was in the form of Toyota's Innova range of MPVs (Innova Crysta and Innova Hycross). However, the Kia Carnival turned out to be a lot bigger and more luxurious than both these models.
This means the Kia Carnival was an MPV with its own segment in India and enjoyed an almost monopoly-like market. Despite that, the sales figures for the Kia Carnival MPV were poor compared to other Kia models in the country.
However, this made Kia Carnival a unique model and one could easily stand out when arriving in the MPV. Furthermore, the sheer size of the MPV also commanded a lot of respect on the road.
Speaking about uniqueness, Kia Carnival is the only premium MPV in India to offer 6 seater, 7 seater, 8 seater, and 9 seater configurations. The 6-seater configuration is the most premium offering with 6 captain seats. On the other hand, the 9-seater configuration came with four rows of seating.
The now-discontinued Kia Carnival MPV used to be powered by a 2.2-litre, turbocharged, diesel engine with 198bhp and 440Nm of torque. Furthermore, this engine came mated to an 8-speed automatic transmission as standard.
That being said, the newer fourth-generation Kia Carnival MPV is already on sale in many countries. Moreover, we expect this next-generation Carnival MPV to reach the Indian shores ahead of the next financial year.
However, we expect the newer model to come with the same 2.2-litre, diesel engine as the discontinued model, given the country's craze for diesel powertrains in larger vehicles. It is also worth mentioning that the fourth-gen Kia Carnival looks a lot more SUV-ish.
Thoughts About Kia India Discontinuing The Kia Carnival MPV
Given
the
low
sales
figures,
the
Kia
Carnival
MPV
was
bound
to
be
discontinued
in
India.
That
being
said,
as
the
third-generation
Kia
Carnival
MPV
is
discontinued
in
India,
we
expect
the
South
Korean
automaker
to
soon
fill
the
void
with
the
newer
fourth-gen
iteration
of
the
MPV.
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