Indian Brands Still Dominate Safest Cars List

At a time when staying safe is the biggest challenge we are facing amidst the coronavirus pandemic, anything that entails safety is taken in high spirits. Road and occupant safety has been paramount for carandbike and we have always voiced our opinions louder than anyone about Safer Cars For India. This, in fact, is in line with the Global New Car Safety Assessment Program's (Global NCAP) cry for 'Safer Cars For India' which started back in 2014. Global NCAP has been no less than a catalyst in pursuing automakers to up the built quality and safety quotient of their models.

Highlights

• Three made-in-India modelsscored 5 Star safety rating in Global NCAP.
• Seven made-in-India modelsscored 4 Star safety rating in Global NCAP.
• Nine made-in-India models scored 3 Star or below rating in Global NCAP.

Global NCAP's data shows that three made-in-India mass-market models boast of a 5 Star safety rating while seven models have received a 4-star safety rating. All the cars get dual-airbags and ABS with EBD as a standard offering, a thing which the Bharat New Vehicle Safety Assessment Program (BNVSAP) norm has mandated now and was on the options list of more carmakers. It just shows how far the auto industry has come when it comes to putting safety ahead of everything else in building cars. In 2014, there wasn't a single made-in-India model that qualified as 'safe' to take the impact of a mild or high-intensity collision at speeds of 64 kmph or above. That said, with times changing and new safety norms like the BNVSAP coming forth, there's been a significant improvement.

The Mahindra XUV300 is the safest made-in-India model currently in India as it has the highest score achieving a full 5-star safety rating for adult occupants and 4 stars for child occupants. The Tata Altroz and Nexon too have achieved 5 Stars in safety rating for adult occupants while both scored 3 Stars for child safety. The Tata Tiago, Tata Tigor and Volkswagen Polo have scored 4 Stars in adult occupants safety rating while they receive three-stars in the child occupant safety rating. Then, the Mahindra Marazzo, Honda Amaze, Toyota Etios, Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza and the Tata Zest (not on sale anymore) bagged 4 Stars in adult occupants' safety and 2 Stars in child occupants safety. Dr, Pawan Goenka, President- Mahindra & Mahindra took to twitter to acknowledge that the Indian brands dominate the safest cars in the country race. He said, "Nowhere is an achievement that is worth tooting our horn for. XUV300 stands at the top amongst the Safest cars in India. Also good to see that 6 of the 7 safest cars are Indian brands."

That said, this is a journey that has just started as some of the bestselling models like the Maruti Suzuki Swift, Marti Suzuki Ertiga, Maruti Suzuki WagonR, Hyundai Santro and the Renault Kwid among others still need to catch up. Despite being in its third-generation, the highly popular Maruti Suzuki Swift has managed to score just 2 Stars in both adult and child occupants' safety, while the Maruti Suzuki Ertiga has scored 3 Stars in both adult and child occupants' safety. The Ford Aspire and Renault Duster get 3 Stars in adult occupant safety and 2 Stars in child occupant safety. The new Maruti Suzuki WagonR and Hyundai Santro have scored 2 Stars in both adult and child occupants' safety, while the Renault Kwid and Datsun Redi-Go manage to get just a single star. Moreover, crash test results for other popular models like the Maruti Suzuki Alto 800 and Maruti Suzuki S-Presso among others are still awaited.