The 250cc segment in the Indian two wheeler market is seeing some action these days. This was once the bread and butter segment for Indian manufacturer Yezdi who made the Jawa 250cc under licence. The smallest motorcycle was the humble Rajdoot which had a 175cc engine. Then there was the Bullet which was all of 350cc. Even the smallest scooter engine capacity was 150cc. Then in the first wave of economic liberalization in the mid 1980’s motorcycles with 100cc capacity were given concessions and thus started the 100cc story in the Indian motorcycle market, a story that sees the refusal of the consumer to move away from that cubic capacity. Anyway, with the launch of the Kawasaki Ninja 250R and more recently the CBR250R from Honda, the focus of the bike enthusiasts has moved to that segment. Of course, there are bigger bikes from Kawasaki, Hyosung, Harley Davidson, Honda and Yamaha but those are too niche for the common man. Towards the beginning of this year Suzuki previewed the GW 250 with two cylinders but producing only a modest 26 PS of power. Now the news comes that the production of the motorcycle has started in China. The question then is will it come to India? Logic dictates that it should, but companies have their own way of assessing markets so who knows. At the unveiling of the bike in Indonesia, Suzuki said that India was definitely under consideration. But that was then, and this is now, so we do not know if there is any change of strategy. It must be said that most of Suzuki’s small capacity Indian made motorcycles have not done well while their best seller is the Access 125 cc scooter which has a waiting period of up to 3 months.
Picture Courtesy: Bike Advice.in
