Car sales in country are back in the positive territory in 2014 with a 2.46 per cent increase on excise duty reductions brought in by the government to propel the struggling industry.
However, with the excise duty concessions gone, industry body SIAM is expecting a marginal increase of around one per cent in this fiscal against an earlier expectation of four per cent. Passenger car sales during the January-December period rose to 18,51,475 units as against 18,06,965 units in 2013, a growth of 2.46 per cent. This is in contrast to the 9.59 per cent dip in 2013 which was the first time in eleven years that car sales declined in the country.
“Vehicle prices were down for the nine months in the previous calender year due to excise duty reductions. It helped in creating a positive sentiment thus helping growth in sales,” Society of Indian Automobile Industry (SIAM) Deputy Director General Sugato Sen told reporters here. “The industry sold 1.8 million cars in 2014, it is not a very significant growth over 2013 but it is better than a negative growth,” he added.
Sen said despite the expiry of excise duty concessions, the industry is expected to grow marginally in the current fiscal. “We expect a low single digit sales growth of around one per cent during the financial year. We are not anticipating negative growth this fiscal,” Sen said, adding that earlier it was estimated that car sales could grow by around four per cent in the current fiscal.