Budget has made fuel prices expensive and hiked the central excise duty but the auto component manufacturers have heaved a sigh of relief. Thus, the budget gets mixed reviews from the Indian auto industry. "It's a good budget. It was a tightrope walk for the finance minister. He has tried to continue the growth stimulus with a lot of prudence," said Vishnu Mathur, Executive Director at the Auto Components Manufacturers Association.
Auto component manufacturers have been anticipating the excise duty hike but are smiling as the Finance Minister has not hiked service tax which was the main cause of worry for the people in business.
This makes the budget more or less industry friendly where the passenger car segment will experience a healthy growth but the commercial vehicle segment may be hit by increase in import duty as well as hike in fuel prices.
Since the dispensable income increases in the market, auto industry in India expects a robust growth in the year to come.
