After the heavy festival season sales in September and mid-October, the automobile companies saw a fall in numbers towards the end of the month, reporting a decline on a year-on-year basis.

Except companies such as Maruti Suzuki India and Toyota Kirloskar Motor in the passenger cars segment, and Royal Enfield and Suzuki Motorcycle in two-wheelers segment, others reported decline in sales in October.

Maruti Suzuki India was the only company which reported more than 9 per cent growth at 1.35 lakh units compared with 1.24 lakh units in October last year.

Hyundai Motor India saw a fall and reported sales of 49,588 units during the month compared with 50,017 units in October last year. Similarly, Honda Cars India reported 9 per cent decline at 14,234 units compared to 15,567 units in same month last year.

Home-grown company Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) reported 5 per cent decline in sales at 23,413 units as against 24,737 units in October 2016.

“The auto industry has had a mixed month. The build up to Dhanteras and Diwali was good but the demand tapered off subsequently. Last year all festivals were in the month of October and the industry volumes had a high base,” Rajan Wadhera, President, Automotive Sector, M&M, said. Among those who reported lowest sales was Ford India, which sold only 4,218 units in the domestic market during the month, down 44 per cent compared with 7,508 units in October last year.

Tata Motors managed to maintain its growth with sales of 16,475 units against 16,311 units in the corresponding month last year.

“We continue to keep the sales momentum going, led by a strong product pipeline of Tiago, Tigor, and Hexa. While we have grown, we could have done better had it not been for the long holiday season. We will maintain cautious optimism in the market and hope to see this momentum continue,” Mayank Pareek, President, Passenger Vehicles Business Unit, Tata Motors, said.

Two-wheelers

In the two-wheeler segment, the number one scooter maker Honda Motorcycle & Scooter reported 7 per cent decline in sales y-o-y to around 4.38 lakh units as against 4.70 lakh units in October 2016.

Sales of TVS Motor Company were also down marginally at 2.70 lakh units in October compared with 2.72 lakh units in the corresponding month of the previous year.

Companies including Hero MotoCorp and Bajaj Auto are expected to declare their sales numbers on Thursday.

In the commercial vehicles segment, all companies, including Ashok Leyland, Volvo Eicher, Tata Motors and M&M, reported growth.

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