In a statement released today, Toyota Kirloskar Motors (TKM) will be recalling 44,989 units of its bestselling MPV Innova in India. The recall has been issued for vehicles manufactured from February 2005 to December 2008. The mandatory recall has been issued due to an error discovered in the spiral cable mounted on the steering wheel, as per Toyota. The exercise is part of a global recall announced for 6.39 million vehicles which includes a total of 25 other models for various issues including faulty cable on the steering wheel, seat rails, engine starters and windshield wiper motors.
The fault leads to continuous illumination of the airbag warning light on the instrument console. This leads to a possibility of the driver side airbag getting deactivated. Toyota is currently in the process of procuring the replacement parts, which once available will be provided to the customers. Customers will be contacted by Toyota dealers for the replacement of parts. The repair will be free of cost and is expected to take around an hour for each vehicle.
This is Toyota’s second biggest recall globally till date on a single day. The company had earlier recalled 7.43 million units of the Yaris, Corolla and other models to repair faulty power window switches. Earlier this year too, Toyota issued a worldwide recall for 1.9 million units of the Prius Hybrid for a software issue leading the car to go into fail safe mode.
In the past, 41,000 units of the Etios twins were recalled back in 2010 and 1100 units of the Corolla Altis diesel were called back in 2013 in the country. This will be Toyota’s fourth major recall in India. Toyota is most likely to be joined by Maruti Suzuki who are to recall 1.5 lakh units of the Swift DZire compact sedan for faulty fuel neck filler component that is connected to the fuel tank.
