Luxury car sales plummet

Mahindra Ford sales dropped 73 per cent, with the company selling merely 180 Ford Escort cars against 677 in the same months last year. General Motors sold 276 cars, 67 per cent lower than April 1997 sales of 851 units.

Mercedes Benz also witnessed a 50 per cent erosion in sales while those of Cielo dropped 39.9 per cent. Hindustan Motors8217; Ambassador and Contessa car sales droppedby 6.1 per cent during the period.

But Honda City seems to be in demand with a sale of 667 units. The car had made its debut on the Indian roads in February this year and has been looking up ever since. In the passenger car segment, Maruti Udyog Limited was the only player which reported higher sales at 23,719 units during April 1998 against 16,799 in the same month the previous year.

PAL Peugeot8217;s sales hit a breaker crashing by 89 per cent during the year, offloading 99 of the Peugeot 309 cars as against 900 in April 1997. With Peugeot having decided to wash its hands off the partnership, PAL is assembling the leftover kits and selling them.

Telco followed closely with an 82 per cent drop in sales with just ten units as against 57 last year.