The Indian unit of the world’s largest carmaker, Toyota, has recalled almost 45,000 units of the Innova MPV to fix a defect in the steering system as part of a bigger global recall of 6.39 million vehicles. The defect poses a potential safety hazard as it can cause the driver’s airbag to get de-activated.
Toyota?s domestic subsidiary, Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM), has called it a ?special service campaign? covering 44,989 units of the Innova manufactured between February 2005 and December 2008.
?The campaign has been announced due to an error in the spiral cable mounted on the steering wheel. This will lead to continuous illumination of an airbag warning lamp on the instrument cluster giving prior indication of a problem to the customer. In addition, the driver?s airbag may get deactivated,? the company said.
Customers will be contacted by TKM dealers once the replacement parts are available, and the company expects the repair to be carried out in approximately an hour.
The announcement comes close on the heels of an expected recall of about 1.5 lakh units of the Dzire compact sedan by Maruti Suzuki due to a faulty fuel neck filler, as reported by FE on April 8. Vehicle recalls have picked pace in India after industry body SIAM launched a voluntary code in 2012, with 2013 witnessing eight such announcements from companies like Honda, Ford and Nissan. The government is also finalising a mandatory framework for vehicle recalls in India, which will fix penalties for negligence.
TKM had recalled 167 units of the Prius hybrid this February due to a software error and over 1,000 Corolla Altis cars in May last year to fix a faulty
drive shaft.
This development comes after parent Toyota Motor Corporation recalled a record 9 million units a few years back and paid $1.2 billion in settlement. Rival General Motors is also under investigation in the
US over a faulty ignition switch, and it had to recall 1.6 million units.