The leading car makers in the Indian auto market have decided to increase the price of their cars from the starting of next month, as the continuously depreciating India rupee has made imports of input materials considerably expensive. The hike in the car prices in the Indian market came at a time, when the industry is already struggling with slowdown in demand due to high fuel priced and interest rates.
The major car makers including Hyundai, Toyota Kirloskar and Mahindra & Mahindra have already announced to hike the prices of their car models.
The market leader Maruti on the other hand, has hiked the prices of its diesel run car models by up to Rs 10,000. In a recent statement given to TOI, Maruti Suzuki India’s CFO Ajay Seth said, "The rupee fall has been very sharp and taken everyone by surprise. No one would have predicted that the slide will be like this."
In a recent statement, General Motors India Vise President, P Balendran said, "We are very badly impacted and will be passing on the increased cost from January. The price increment should be in the range of 1-2 %." He added that the total import content is about 21% of net sales, directly as well as indirectly. There has to be some intervention by the RBI now.
