Global NCAP’s ‘Safer Cars for India’ campaign has surely benefited the Indian automobile industry by emphasising how important vehicular safety actually is
Until a few years ago, safety features were considered a luxury and even basic active safety features were only offered either with luxury cars, or the top-end variants of mass market cars. However, things have changed drastically, thanks to Global NCAP (New Car Assessment Program)’s ‘Safer Cars for India’ campaign which commenced in 2014.
This campaign served as real eye opener for the government and automakers plying in the market, and resulted in the government emphasising vehicular safety, and therefore, adopting more stringent crash and safety requirements for cars sold in the country. Today, safety features have become of the first and foremost aspects that one considers while buying a new car.
Global NCAP has released a list of the 38 cars that are sold or were sold in India at a particular time, which the independent organisation tested. It has to be a moment of pride for all Indians, since 7 out of the top 10 spots are taken by Indian manufacturers.
Mahindra took the first place with the XUV300 that scored 5 stars in adult occupant protection and 4 stars in child occupant protection, making it the safest car in the Indian market. On the other hand, Tata Motors took the second, third, fourth and fifth spots with the Altroz, Nexon (manufactured after 7 December, 2019), Nexon (manufactured before 7 December, 2019) and Tiago/Tigor respectively.
The Nexon originally scored four stars in adult occupant protection safety, but Tata wasn’t satisfied and made some changes to it and sent it back for another round of tests. The Nexon managed to get 5 stars the second time. Both the Altroz and the Nexon scored 5 stars and 3 stars in adult occupant protection and child occupant safety respectively.
The sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth positions were taken up by Volkswagen Polo, Mahindra Marazzo, Toyota Etios, Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza and Tata Zest respectively. All these cars managed to score a 4-star rating in adult occupant safety in the Global NCAP crash tests.