Passenger vehicles sales fall over 40% in Sept amid rising costs, chip crunch

India's overall domestic passenger vehicle sales fell 41.2% to 160,070 units from 272,027 units a year ago in September, Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) data showed on Thursday. The sales dropped as high commodity prices and semiconductor crunch aggravated problems for automakers.
 
Domestic passenger vehicle (PV) sales dropped 30.7% month-on-month to 1.60 lakh units in September, the auto industry body's data showed further. September’s PV sales were far lower than August’s 2.32 lakh on a sequential basis. Domestic PV sales stood at 2.72 lakh units in September last year.
 
PV sales data comprises cars, utility vehicles and vans. The combined production of passenger vehicles, three-wheelers, two-wheelers and quadricycles stood at 21.25 lakh units in September this year.

While 3.58 lakh two-wheeler units were exported, 38,518 three-wheeler units were exported in September 2021. Overall, 53,586 passenger vehicle units were exported during the month.
 
In the two-wheeler segment, scooter sales saw a decline of 7 per cent from 5.56 lakh units in September 2020 to 5.17 lakh units in September 2021.

Motorcycle sales, on the other hand, went down by 22 per cent to 9.48 lakh units last month from 12.24 lakh units in the year-ago period.

Vehicle sales across categories dropped 20 per cent from 21.40 lakh units in the year-ago period to 17.17 lakh units in September this year.

“Indian automobile industry continues to face new challenges. While on one hand, we are seeing a revival in vehicle demand, on the other hand, shortage of semiconductor chips is causing a major concern for the industry. Many members have curtailed their production plans," SIAM President Kenichi Ayukawa was quoted by news agency PTI as saying.