Maruti board on a junket as market share falls

The board is likely to discuss ways to achieve Euro-II compliance by April 2000 and its financial implications. The launch of the much-awaited new models and the decline in marketshare of MUL in the Indian passenger car market, are also likely to figure in the board meeting.

Maruti has recorded a 17 per cent sales jump in the first quarter of the current fiscal despite no sales during May in the Delhi region, country’s biggest car market and one-week plant shut-down.

However, MUL’s mid-sized car model Esteem could not perform on thesame lines as there was a zero per cent growth in sales during the review period. The company sold 4,000 units of Esteem in the first quarter of 1999-2000, the same number of vehicles sold in the corresponding period last fiscal. The same trend was witnessed by Gypsy model as sales were stagnant at 1400 units during the period. MUL sold a total 3.03 lakh vehicles during the fiscal 1998-99.

Maruti sold 17,500 Zen cars during April-June of 1999-2000 as against 16,500 units in the corresponding period of the previous fiscal.

MUL, which has a market share of over 70 per cent in the passenger car market, sold 87,143 vehicles (excluding Gypsy) during April-June 1999-2000 as against recorded sales of 74,385 vehicles in the same period of 1998-99, sources said.