Official: Ashok Leyland Stile to be launched on October 8

We've received word from Ashok Leyland that the Stile will be launched on October 8. Unveiled twice, the first time at the 2012 Auto Expo and again in July this year, the Ashok Leyland Stile is the badge-engineered version of the Nissan Evalia.

Sporting a completely different front fascia, Ashok Leyland designers seem to have done a good job on the Stile. That's not the only difference between the Stile and the Evalia though. Where the Nissan sports fixed 'butterfly' windows for the second row, the Stile's can be slid fore and aft, thus improving the ventilation.

On the display vehicle unveiled by Nissan CEO, Carlos Ghosn, we noticed features such as a rear wiper and washer, captain seats for the second row, floor mounted secondary aircon vents and a proper glove compartment, which are otherwise missing even on the top-end variant of the Evalia.

Powering the Stile is the same 1.5-liter Renault-sourced K9K diesel engine, albeit in a different state of tune. Appropriately codenamed 'DIET', Ashok Leyland has detuned the engine to offer 75bhp and 185Nm of torque (from the Evalia's 84.8bhp and 200Nm of torque). We get the impression that the Stile will better the Evalia's efficiency of 19.3km/l thanks to this detuning.

The Stile will be built at the same Oragadam facility as the Evalia. It would be marketed to fleet operators, hotels, courier services and ambulance operators.