Car sales up 18% in FY05

Healthy sales of passenger cars, motorcycles and commercial vehicles enabled the automobile industry to grow  15.9% to 78,96,475 units in the domestic market in the fiscal ended March 31, 2005. The figure stood at 68,10,537 units in 2003-04.

Passenger car sales moved up 17.7% to 8,19,918 units in FY05 from 6,96,153 units in the previous year, according to figures released by Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers  (SIAM).

While Maruti Udyog's sales moved up 16.5% to 4,17,179 units, Tata Motors saw sales move up an impressive 33.9% to 1,44,827 units. Hyundai India, which has seen a spurt in demand in export markets, recorded domestic sales of 1,41,830 units.

Car sales in March were up 18.5% to 89,493 units as against 75,476 units in March 2004.

In the motorcycles segment, Hero Honda and Bajaj Auto powered sales to a 19% growth in 2004-05 to 49,64,442 units as against 41,70,445 units in the previous fiscal.

Sales in March stood at 4,36,727 units as against 3,69,309 units in March 2004 - a growth of 18.2%.