Mahindra Marazzo Test Drive Review – Best Mahindra Yet?

Interiors – The Mahindra Marazzo feels fresh as soon as you step inside and see the massive dashboard, courtesy the cab forward design. Fit-finish and quality is the best we have seen in any Mahindra vehicle yet and the piano black touch also looks cool but the white accents on the left side of the dash look outright gaudy. Marazzo engineers have dived deep in the Mahindra’s parts bin, so the AC switches come from the XUV meanwhile the steering buttons come from the Tivoli.

Interior quality is good but the MPV gets some quirky bits which aren’t needed

The Mahindra Marazzo is a practical car with a ton of storage bins, like the door pockets which are large enough on all doors but not easy to access on the rear doors. Ergonomic oversight isn’t restricted just to the doors as the Control + C and Control + V handbrake job from MINI (you can call it aircraft style) is just unnecessary because not only does it occupy more space, it’s difficult to operate too, specially for an MPV owner whose idea of excitement in life is usually going to the grocery store. The ports next to the handbrake to charge the phone are again not easily accessible, so is the space right behind due to the arm rests for front passengers, although you do get twin cupholders over there. The storage on top of the dash is deep, deep enough for you to put small items and never see them again, it’s like Mumbai’s potholes, you don’t know the depth unless you put your hand through.

However, the seats are superb on the Mahindra Marazzo, they are big and supportive, offering good underthigh support and headroom on all rows with good legroom and kneeroom for second and third row passengers, yes, this is a proper 7-seater with the unique roof mounted AC vents working wonders to cool the cabin, oh wait, the air-conditioner on our test car wasn’t working, it was just throwing out hot air, Mahindra still needs to sort out niggles with better QC.

You can flip forward the last two rows of seats to haul luggage and the last row needs to be shut, it’s a must, if you must carry some sizeable luggage because with all rows of seats up, the boot is miniscule. The features list is plenty, LED DRLs, projector headlights, an instrument cluster which swipes its needles for reasons best known to him/her (with a multi-information display right in between), dual airbags, ABS, ISOFIX child seat mounts and a 7-inch touchscreen infotainment system with reverse parking camera that shows guidelines and also helps you in parking with audio visual guidance. The said system also has Navigation and there is Android Auto too but unfortunately iPhone users aren’t the MPV type so Mahindra has skipped on Apple CarPlay.

Shockingly, the Marazzo misses out on features which cars half its price carry, keyless entry, push button start, auto-dimming inside rearview mirror but there is a conversation mirror to make up for all that and a picture viewer too. Other small bits like the Mahindra Blue Sense app, voice assist, follow me home headlamps, sunglass holder near the IRVM, cooled glovebox, purple illumination of the cluster (really?) and fake leather are also part of kit but I believe this is the fifth para of interiors, so those reading might have already skipped to the next section of this review which happens to be…