What's with these newspaper car advisors ? Goof-up by even 'The Hindu' is shocking!!!

Among the English dailies in India, 'The Hindu' is considered top-notch in terms of quality, content, error-free reporting, lack of bias, newsprint, lack of Page3 content etc. In my
opinion, it is the best English newspaper in India and this is after sampling various dailies available in different parts of India.

So every Wednesday, I do not miss the 'Metro Plus' supplement which has 2 pages dedicated
to cars - new models, vintage and ofcourse the 'Virtual Mechanic' which can be called the print equivalent of www.team-bhp.com's (my favourite car forum) "What car?" section.

Yesterday's 'Virtual Mechanic' had this query by a reader (D. Adarsh) :

Q : Can you tell me about the brands that are likely to be launched within the next year, in
the same segment as the Maruti SX4? What about the VW Jetta? Will it be competitively
priced like the Fabia Diesel? Are there any other VW brands likely to be launched in the
Rs. 6-9 lakh range? Will Honda come up with a diesel version of either the new City or the
Jazz?

And the answer was :

A : The next six months will be quite exciting in terms of launches. The new Toyota Corolla is expected in September 2009 & will be priced between Rs.10-12 lakh & the Fiat Linea
is expected at the same time and will be priced between Rs.7-9 lakh. The VW Jetta is expected in July 2009 and should cost between Rs.13-16 lakh and will come with a petrol
and diesel engine. There is no model from VW expected in the Rs. 6-9 lakh range this year,
but the Polo will come out next year. There are no plans for diesel engines for either the Jazz
or the new City.

To say I was shocked would be an understatement. I first checked the date of the newspaper, thinking that maybe I am reading an old paper. But no, it was a supplement dated 18-Feb-09.

The Corolla Altis has been launched only few months ago. So I wondered how a new one is expected just 7 months later. I ignored this bit thinking that the Altis was anyway a minor makeover. So maybe Toyota will bring in a fresh new Corolla, though I don't remember
reading anything about this on tbhp.

But then he goes on to say that the Linea is also expected in Sep 2009. We have reams of
pages on team-bhp detailing Linea test-drives on the forum and people have booked it and
some have even brought it home. And these guys are telling the reader to wait for it.

And then the article says that VW Jetta is expected in July 2009. I had read about the Jetta being already in the market, but since I am not much interested in 10lakh+ cars, I was not
too sure. So checked the VW site online and yes, they have the Jetta on sale.

I just can't believe that 'The Hindu' had this on their pages.

P.S. : Here is the full article.