Car sales to pick up this week: Auto companies

 The car market is all prepared for the Navratra festival in India. The companies are expecting good business in this auspicious week i.e. last week of March. Industry people say that customers would purchase car in Navratra. Rajeev Sawhney, promoter of TR Sawhney Motors, a Delhi-based Maruti dealer said that they had also scaled up the inventory to meet the huge demand expected in the last week of March. They aimed to sell around 500 cars in the week. On the other hand, sale of cars this year is not good comparatively to the previous FY year. It shows growth of 12 per cent in 2008-09 but double digit.

The industry posted sales of 13.86 lakh units till February. Small cars, which account for over 66% of the passenger car industry, have been the worst performers, and the post-April outlook looks bleak too. “There is a pick-up in sales volume since January this year, and March car sales are expected to be better than February. However, it will be lower than last year’s sales,” said a senior car company official. Domestic passenger car sales went up by 21.8% to 1.15 lakh units in February 09 from 94,757 units last year. It is expected to reach the same sales tally in March 09. The Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers is not expecting much of an increase in sales on an annual basis. The reason of this poor performance includes high interest rates and liquidity crunch. Due to this finance penetration fell from 78% to 59% in Feb 09.