India car sales up 3 percent in May ’14, scooters on a roll

There’s good news for the Indian auto sector at the height of India’s summer. May 2014 sales numbers are out and as per apex industry body SIAM’s sales statistics, passenger car sales have risen 3.08 percent to 148,577 units as against 144,132 units in the year-earlier month.

Inclusive of utility vehicles and vans, the passenger vehicle segment has seen a 2.76 percent rise to 207,953 units last months and, even though it is too early to describe this as a recovery, there will be a lot of hope.

As expected, the Indian scooter segment is on a roll. Sales rose by 35 percent to 357,564 units as against 265,892 units in May 2013, riding on a slew of new launches from Honda, Yamaha and Suzuki.

In the motorcycle segment, sales rose 11.71 percent to 984,469 units as against 881,288 in May last year. Overall, the two-wheeler segment’s sales rose 16.30 percent year on year to 1,402,830 units and continues to drive overall industry numbers into positive territory.  

Commercial vehicle sales dropped by 15.28 percent in May 2014, with M&HCV numbers declining by 10.51 percent to 16,572 units.

For the April-May 2014 two-month period in the current fiscal, sales are still down though. Passenger vehicle sales are down 3.46 percent albeit UV sales alone are up 2.46 percent. For the auto segment as a whole, sales are up 10.13 percent. Here too, scooters lead the way with a handsome 30 percent increase followed by motorcycle sales that rose by nearly 10 percent.