Honda recalls over 41,000 cars in India due to faulty airbags

The affected car models include the Honda Accord, City, Jazz and Civic, and the move is part of a global recall.

Honda India, which is nearly ready to launch its upcoming 2017 Honda City facelift and bolster sales of its best-selling premium sedan, has recently recalled 41,580 units of its past-generation models. The affected models include the older-generation Honda City and the Honda Accord and Civic sedans, along with the last-gen Honda Jazz. The recalls were announced as part of a global move to fix faulty airbags in the cars supplied by Takata. With this latest set of recalls, Honda Cars India has officially pulled back around 3 lakh units in India so far. The affected cars are all made in 2012.

Honda Cars India said in a statement about the recall, HCIL will voluntarily replace Takata passenger front airbag inflators of 41,580 vehicles of previous generation of Jazz, City, Civic and Accord as part of Honda’s precautionary global recall campaign concerning Takata front airbag inflators. It said that 659 units of the Honda Accord will be affected by the recall, along with 1,200 Honda Civics, 7,265 Honda Jazz units and 32,456 units of the Honda City. The replacements will be free for the customers and will start immediately. Customers will be directly contacted for the recall. Also Read: Honda City 2017 facelift variant details & colour options revealed

The new recall is the second one after July 2016, when Honda Cars India recalled around 1.90 lakh units of its Honda Jazz, City, Civic, Accord and Honda CR-V models. The reason back then was the same: it had to replace the faulty Takata-sourced airbags. The defective airbags supplied by the Japanese company have affected millions of cars worldwide, and not just Honda models. Automakers such as Ford, Mitsubishi, Toyota, Subaru, Nissan, BMW and Chrysler have made recalls to replace the problematic airbags. Also Read: Honda WR-V production starts; launch in India in March 2017

The Takata airbag issue has taken the whole automotive world by storm, with nearly 24 automakers pulling back several million vehicles. The issue at hand involves defects in the airbag inflator that can cause shrapnel to be deployed accidently in case of a crash. The result is that the passenger and/or driver are met with high-velocity metal fragments instead of an impact-absorbing airbag. Only six makes were seemingly affected at first when Takata announced the defect way back in April 2013.