The country’s largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki on Friday said bookings declined 20 per cent in the October-November period, compared to the same period last year, as the cash crunch following demonetisation led to a fall in demand.
The auto major, however, said the situation has improved this month and bookings have grown 7 per cent as compared to December last year.
The auto major also announced that it will invest around ₹3,800 crore in its upcoming R&D centre at Rohtak by March 2019.
“The numbers that we have show that demonetisation did lead to a dip in bookings in November. Bookings as well as True Value sales...if we take October-November period than retail sales were still 6-7 per cent higher than last year. But bookings in November certainly fell 20 per cent as compared to last year,” Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) Chairman RC Bhargava told reporters.
“So it indicates that immediately after demonetisation took place, certain amount of uncertainty and concern was there among people as what it means, but the trend has changed and from minus 20 per cent last month, the company has seen bookings grow 7 per cent in December,” Bhargava added.