Muristek
Vijay C Roy
Chandigarh, April 15
Despite 4% decline in sales in March and disruptions such as semiconductor shortage and Covid's second wave, passenger vehicle sales increased by 13% in FY22 and crossed the psychological 30-lakh milestone (fourth time in the history) at 30,69,499 units.
Prior to 2021-22, the industry crossed the 30-lakh mark in 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19 before slipping in 2019-20 and 2020-21 due to the Covid.
"We are anticipating that industry sales will cross 30.60 lakh units by the end of March 2022, a growth of about 13-14% over 2020-21 when total volume was 27.11 lakh units," Shashank Srivastava, senior executive director, marketing amp; sales, Maruti Suzuki India, earlier told The Tribune.
Passenger vehicles sales had crossed the 30-lakh mark for the first time in 2016-17 when the sales stood at 30.46 lakh units. In 2017-18, the industry closed the fiscal at 32.88 lakh units and in 2018-19 it touched 33.77 lakh before slipping to 27.73 lakh and 27.11 lakh units in 2019-20 and 2020-21, respectively.
Despite the growth in FY22, the industry is yet to touch pre-Covid levels.