The Maruti 1000, made by Maruti Udyog

Maruti Udyog

Maruti Suzuki India Limited is a subsidiary company of Japanese automobile and motorcycle manufacturer Suzuki. The company offers a complete range of cars from entry level Maruti 800 and Alto, to hatchback Ritz, A-Star, Swift, Wagon-R, Estillo and sedans DZire, SX4, in the 'C' segment Maruti Eeco ...

 was the first ever contemporary sedan-type car launched in India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

. The car (which Suzuki

Suzuki

is a Japanese multinational corporation headquartered in Hamamatsu, Japan that specializes in manufacturing compact automobiles and 4x4 vehicles, a full range of motorcycles, all-terrain vehicles , outboard marine engines, wheelchairs and a variety of other small internal combustion engines...

 sold in other countries as the Cultus/Swift/Geo Metro with a 1.3 L

Litre

pic|200px|right|thumb|One litre is equivalent to this cubeEach side is 10 cm1 litre water = 1 kilogram water The litre is a metric system unit of volume equal to 1 cubic decimetre , to 1,000 cubic centimetres , and to 1/1,000 cubic metre...

 or 1.6 L engine) was introduced in October, 1990. Sold at Rs. 3.81 lakh

Lakh

A lakh is a unit in the Indian numbering system equal to one hundred thousand . It is widely used both in official and other contexts in Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and is often used in Indian English.-Usage:...

, it was back then the costliest car released in the Indian market. With a large waiting list for all Maruti cars, a computerised lottery was used to decide who got a chance to buy a Maruti 1000. The car came with a 970 cc engine whose output was just 45 bhp and proved underpowered for a car that weighed 850 kg

Kilogram

The kilogram or kilogramme , also known as the kilo, is the base unit of mass in the International System of Units and is defined as being equal to the mass of the International Prototype Kilogram , which is almost exactly equal to the mass of one liter of water...

. In 1994 an upgraded version of the car, with more powerful engine, was released and renamed the Maruti Esteem. The Maruti 1000 was still under production till 2000 and was discontinued due to low sales.The Esteem production ended in November 2007, and the car has been replaced by the new Suzuki Swift DZire.