NEW DELHI: Traffic jams, parking problems, app-based cabs, online shopping and fast-spreading metro networks have resulted in car sales starting to fall in big cities, something many hoped for but few expected to become a reality.
City-specific numbers accessed by TOI from industry sources show car sales dropped 20 per cent in Mumbai in 2017-18—97,274 cars sold during the year versus 1.22 lakh in the previous year. Bangalore, with its choked infrastructure but younger and tech-savvy population, saw car sales fall 11 per cent. Bangalore is India’s second-largest car market.
The country’s largest car market, Delhi, recorded a marginal growth of 1.6 per cent, and that too because of the lower base of 2016-17 when diesel car sales were banned for a few months.
Falling or flat metro markets in a year when all-India sales grew by 10 per cent is seen as an evolutionary trend, and not an aberration. "Metro cities are surely seeing challenges in volume growth on account of rising trend of shared mobility through platforms such as Ola and Uber," says Rakesh Srivastava, director (Sales & Marketing) with Hyundai India.
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