Car-makers to increase prices from January

Tata Motors, one of the  largest sellers of commercial vehicles in the country, was the first to announce such a hike Saturday for all its commercial vehicles and some cars. 

"Tata Motors will increase prices of some passenger vehicles and all of its commercial vehicles. The increase is effective from today (Saturday)," the company said in a statement.  
The  price hike will vary from one model to another. While Tata Indica and Tata Indigo family will see a price rise in the range of Rs.3,000 to Rs.15,000, the hike in utility vehicles such as Tata Sumo, Tata Grande MK II, Tata Safari and Tata Xenon will be in the range of Rs.8,700 to Rs.14,500.

The commercial vehicles will witness a price hike in the range of Rs.1,500 to Rs.30,000.
Recently other auto-makers such as Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai Motor India and General Motors also hinted at increasing the price of their vehicles.

The input costs include cost of materials like natural rubber, pig iron, rolled steel and metals such as aluminium and copper.

In the last six months, prices of natural rubber have risen by 40 percent while that of pig iron increased by 25 percent. Hot rolled steel prices are up 22 percent and prices of forging steel jumped by 10 percent.

Costs of aluminium and copper also witnessed increases by 4 and 3 percent, respectively.