Classic Tales: Premier Rio. India’s first compact SUV?
It is hard to forget the car brand Premier, it was one of the first car manufacturers in India. We know the car bought the Padmini that was the re-badged version of Fiat 1100 here. Thereafter the brand manufactured a couple of more cars, one was ‘Rio’.
One might or might now have heard about the car but yes it is there and yes it didn’t do well in the Indian market. Premier Rio was the first entrant into compact SUV category before it became a hot-selling segment.
Premier Automobiles had exited the industry back in early-2000s. However, the company bounced back with the Rio in 2009. Rio was basically the Zoyte Nomad which was a rebadged version of Daihatsu Terios. PAL was importing CKD kits and assembling them at its Pune facility. Priced at around ₹ 5.1lakh, Rio was o...