The month of April 2012 has been a witness to passive sales in the Indian automobile industry. This was quite unexpected after almost a month of high sales in the month of March 2012. Almost all automobile manufacturers across the nations have reported a marginal increase and in some cases the companies have even stated a significant decline in sales in the month of April 2012. Maruti Suzuki, presently enjoying the position as India's largest carmaker has recently posted a decline of about 1.3 per cent in its passenger car sales. It has seriously mentioned that the mini car segment has seen a significant slowdown in overall sales in the mini car segment.
The overall sales in the month of March 2012 have witnessed a rise in response to the expected increase in the prices as well as excise duty across various car models in the Indian auto industry. The month of April in the current year has seen retarded growth. The problem is the increase in car prices applied by Indian automakers.
The Indian automobile makers have been anticipating reduction in the loaning rate proposed by the Reserve Bank of India. This has been an attempt to encourage purchase sentiments in the average Indian consumer. As per the Chief General Manager (Marketing) of Maruti Suzuki India, Mr. Shashank Srivastava, the markdown in car rate might not have a critical influence on sales for the other factors including high prices for petrol remain untouched.
Even though, there has been an upsurge in request for the diesel driven cars, the demand for petrol cars has been affected due to the result of it and this is on a continuous decline at present. The auto industry is quite disturbed about the minor decline in the sales. However, some of the automakers are optimistic about the sales in the long run with many new cars in the pipeline to attract consumers.