India to produce 3 million cars

Driven by rising purchasing power and a spate of new launches, India will produce 3 million cars by the end of the fiscal, making it the world’s sixth largest car manufacturing country in the world after South Korea, said senior officials in automobile companies. China tops the list with an annual production of 1.38 crore cars. Currently, India is the seventh largest carmaker after Brazil. The Indian car market, which produced 26.78 lakh cars in the April-February period, will notch up the sixth position due to phenomenal growth in sales this fiscal, beating the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers’ (SIAM) earlier projection of India finding a place among the world’s top six carmakers by 2015. With several new launches set to drive up sales, India may produce 34.5 lakh cars in the new fiscal. Demand in the last fiscal was mainly driven by the new launches. Maruti’s R3, Honda’s Brio, Toyota’s Liva and GM’s Sail are among the 50 new cars, which are set to hit the market by FY12. Fresh capacities, which can produce an additional one million cars, will go on stream next year. Maruti Suzuki is coming up with a new 2.5-lakh cars plant in Haryana, while Renault’s 2-lakh cars-a-year plant at Chennai is expected to come up in the new fiscal.