Sometimes, difficult though it is to believe, disasters herald miracles. Three years ago, a bad distribution and service network had led Fiat's brand charisma to take a bruising fall from grace. Production of its automobiles, the Uno, Siena, Palio and Adventure, had dwindled from 32,000 cars in 2002 to a dismal 1,732 in 2005. Even the Gods, it appeared, had conspired against the company, as the catastrophic Mumbai flood of July 2005 brought Fiat's Kurla plant to a total standstill, nearly drowning one of India's most enduring brands in its fury. At that point, when even thoughts of a comeback appeared to be sacrilege, the whirr of a new engine sparked life into the sinking brand. In Europe, Fiat's new 1.3 multijet diesel engine was filling up order books, and the waiting period for a Fiat car in Europe climbed to eight months. The company's plant in Bielsko-Biala, Poland, now manufactures over 3,200 power trains (engines and transmissions of a car) in a day. So far, Fiat has produced about 2.5 million multijet engines around the world. It is a feat that Fiat India would like to replicate. "The new plant in Ranjangaon will produce 820 engines a day,' says Rajeev Kapoor, CEO of Fiat India, in Ranjangaon, Maharashtra. "This will include both the multijet diesel, and gasoline engines.' Kapoor's voice is full of hope; a hope propelled, fittingly perhaps, by the most fundamental component of a car: its engine. Turn The Ignition Unlike other diesel engines, which are larger, fit bigger cars, and have different brake horsepower, Fiat's 1.3 multijet can serve a car as small as the Maruti 800. With a higher bar pressure, it generates better power and is more fuel efficient. All new Common Rail Technologies (CRT, aka the 1.3 multijet and Hyundai's diesel engine), do the same thing, but none are comparably as light or powerful. Fiat's 1.3 multijet also runs as soundlessly as a petrol engine. Most uniquely, the wonder engine fits varying ranges of small and medium cars after being recalibrated for different gradients. Indeed, other brands such as Maruti Suzuki (for Swift and Swift Dzire) and Opel (for Corsa) have recalibrated and used Fiat's 1.3 multijet. Tata Motors, which is in a Rs 4,000-crore joint venture with Fiat, says it will manufacture 1.3 multijets for the yet-to-be-launched Indica X1. "This diesel engine was selected for its merits of technology and efficiency, and its readiness to meet pollution and environment norms,' says a spokesman of Maruti Suzuki, which has obtained the 1.3 multijet technology through a technical licence agreement with Fiat and General Motors' (GM) Adam Opel. It was rated