Yet another blow to the auto sector

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New Delhi: The terrorist attack in Mumbai has come as yet another blow to the Indian automobile industry, which is already reeling under a sales slump due to high interest rates and lack of finance availability.

According to industry experts, Mumbai accounts for about seven per cent of total car sales in India, selling about 7,000 units a month. End of month is when most of the sales happen and the terrorist attack has come as yet another setback in the overall negative situation, they said.

“This is definitely a blow to the auto industry. Mumbai is one of our biggest markets,” a Hyundai Motor India official said.

As such these are difficult times for the auto industry and the incident will at least temporarily affect business, the official added. General Motors India vice-president corporate affairs, P Balendran said the company has instructed its expat employees to avoid travelling to Mumbai.

“As our plant it located in Pune, we have asked our employees, specially the expatriates to avoid passing through Mumbai. We have advised them to directly fly into Pune,” Balendran said.

He said while it is too early to asses what kind of impact will the terror attack would have in the car sales, it would definitely dampen sentiments which are already low. In October domestic passenger car sales went into reverse gear with a 6.59 per cent fall at 98,900 units, against 1,05,877 units in the same month last year.