2019 ICOTY winner to be announced today
The Indian Car of the Year award, popularly known as the ICOTY, needs no introduction as the most important and most definitive automotive award in India. The winner of the 2019 ICOTY will be announced at a glittering event today evening in Mumbai. What makes the ICOTY so important is the fact that its jury includes some of the most eminent journalists from all the leading automotive publications in India. This year's jury includes Yogendra Pratap and Rahul Ghosh from Auto Today, Dhruv Behl and Ishan Raghava from AutoX, Aspi Bhathena and Sarmad Kadiri from Car India, Sirish Chandran and Aninda Sardar from evo India, Hani Musthafa from Flywheel, Pablo Chaterji from Mans World, Kartik Ware and Raunak Ajinkya from Motoring World, Abhay Verma, Bob Rupani and Rohit Paradkar from OVERDRIVE, Muralidhar Swaminathan from The Hindu Business Line, Girish Karkera and Agasti Kaulgi from Top Gear India and Vikrant Singh from Carwale.com.
All the above journalists have been driving and evaluating cars for at least a decade each and their coming together along with the fact that they represent the best automotive publications in the country is what makes the ICOTY the biggest car award in India. In what is a first for the ICOTY, the jury round was held at the Buddh International Circuit, India's only Formula One graded circuit. The ICOTY has been in existence for 14 years and continues to go from strength to strength with each passing year. 2018 has been one of the busiest years in recent times for the jury in fact, given the number of cars that have been launched this year. The jury members however shortlisted 8 cars for the 2019 ICOTY award, including the Honda Amaze, Honda CR-V, Hyundai Santro, Mahindra Alturas G4, Mahindra Marazzo, Maruti Suzuki Swift, Maruti Suzuki Ertiga and Toyota Yaris.
In addition, the 2019 ICOTY will also see the institution of a new award under the ICOTY, christened the Premium Car Award. Only cars that are new and are manufactured or locally assembled in India are eligible for the ICOTY, but the Premium Car Award will also recognise cars that are brought into the country via the CBU route as fully-built units. Further, the ICOTY does not have a price range for cars to be eligible for the award, but for a car to be eligible for the Premium Car Award it has to be priced upwards of Rs 40 lakh ex-showroom. The list of contenders for this year's Premium Car Award includes the Audi Q5, Audi RS5, BMW X3, BMW 6 Series GT, Lexus ES300h, Mercedes-Benz E 63 S, Mini Countryman, Porsche Cayenne, Range Rover Velar, Volvo XC40 and the Volvo XC60.