The Tata Sumo Everyone's Totally Forgotten
When you hear the word "Sumo" in India, people instantly think of a rugged, utilitarian vehicle. It’s an SUV or MUV that was popular in the rural market and police fleets. Even many large families bought this SUV, and it was even used by the Indian Army. While everyone remembers the good old boxy-looking Sumo, there was one iteration that came to the market towards the end of its life cycle. It was called the Sumo Grande, and we are sure that not many people would actually remember it.
Before we talk about the Sumo Grande, let’s take a quick look at the original Sumo. It was launched in 1994, and it was named after Sumant Moolgaokar, a former chief executive of Tata Engineering and Locomotive Company. The original Sumo was known for its boxy design, which was extremely utilitarian and no-nonsense. It was an MUV, but because of its rugged design, the Sumo was often considered an SUV.
Over the years, we saw multiple iterations of the Sumo in the Indian market, and in 2008, Tata decided to take things to the next level by launching the next generation of the Sumo under the name Sumo Grande.
The Sumo Grande, as mentioned, was launched in 2008, and it was introduced as a premium MUV that would compete with the likes of the Toyota Innova and Mahindra Xylo. Tata changed the exterior design of the Sumo and gave it a more soft-roader or crossover-like exterior design. In order to differentiate it from the regular Sumo, they called it the Sumo Grande.
It was based on the same platform as the Safari and Xenon pickup truck. In fact, the front-end design reminded many people of the pickup. The Sumo Grande offered features like beige interiors, power windows, dual AC vents, and a dashboard with wooden inserts to give it a premium look.
Coming to the engine, the Tata Sumo Grande was powered by the 2.2-litre DICOR turbo-diesel engine. This was the same engine used in the Tata Safari. It pushed out a healthy 118 Bhp and 250 Nm of torque. The engine was mated to a 5-speed manual transmission that powered the rear wheels.
Tata even tried to give the Sumo Grande an update in 2009. They tweaked the suspension settings and made other cosmetic changes.
While the Sumo Grande felt like an update over the regular Sumo on paper, it failed miserably in the Indian market. On paper, it was a spacious, comfortable, modern SUV with a Safari engine. The first thing that didn’t work in favour of many customers was the design. When people heard the name Sumo, they associated it with a rugged, boxy-looking utilitarian MUV.
However, the new Grande felt like a departure from that. Other than this, the Sumo badge was also associated with taxis in many markets, and that image didn’t work well with customers either. Apart from this, many people also had issues with the fit and finish and build quality of the Grande.
By this time, the Toyota Innova had also become hugely popular in the market, and all this didn’t work well for Tata and the Sumo Grande. The MUV was discontinued in 2014, and Tata surprisingly brought back the original Sumo shape to the market and sold it until 2019.