Jaguar Land Rover to increase manufacturing in India

Tata Group-owned luxury car maker Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) today said it is looking to increase manufacturing of its vehicles in India in order to escape the high duty on its products imported to the country.

While speaking to PTI on the sidelines of SIAM summit, JLR Executive Director Mike Wright said vehicles imported from the UK to India attract very high custom duty, so the company may look at producing more vehicles locally.

"We are looking at the opportunity to introduce more locally produced models in India," Wright said when asked if JLR would assemble other models apart form 'Freelander' in India.

A fully built vehicle attracts import duty of up to 110%in India.

In May this year, JLR opened its first assembly plant in Pune to assemble sports utility vehicle Land Rover Freelander 2 from completely knocked down (CKD) kits shipped from the Halewood manufacturing unit in Liverpool, UK.

In Tata Motors Annual Report for 2010-11, Tata Sons Chairman Ratan Tata had said the group's British firm JLR, is looking at increasing its assembly operations in India, besides planning to start assembling in China as well.

"Assembly operations in India have commenced for the Land Rover Freelander. Assembly of other Land Rover products are also under consideration," Tata had said.