GST Cuts Spark Bumper Navratri Bookings And Deliveries For Mahindra, Maruti

The timing of India's GST rejig has created a perfect storm for the automobile sector. As buyers rushed to capitalise on reduced tax rates, dealerships across the country witnessed a landmark day in automotive retail history. Riding on the momentum from the GST rejig, the dealers saw bumper demand on the first day of Navratri (Monday). The revised rates also became effective yesterday where GST on small cars and SUVs came down from 28 per cent to 18 per cent and it was a record opening day of Navratri for Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), a dealer told ACKO Drive.

50% More Bookings For M&M

The immediate impact of the GST rejig was felt by dealers and they reported unprecedented footfall and serious buyer intent replacing the usual window shopping behaviour typical of festival period.

"For the industry, the first day of Navratri was great on two contexts: the best-ever day for deliveries and the best-ever day for bookings. The deliveries would have been more, but because of the inauspicious Shradh period, people were not buying anything. So, same-day deliveries and booking is not easy unless the customer is getting it financed on his own or has direct payment to do. So, that was a hinderance, or else the delivery would have also been even something phenomenal. We've done at least 50 per cent more, but still, it is great," Vinkesh Gulati, Director, United Automobiles (M&M dealer) and Past President, FADA told ACKO Drive on Tuesday.

"A lot of new enquiries and a lot of bookings happened, which normally didn't happen earlier because people were just approaching. I'm talking about other years when people were approaching before the Navratri and the inauspicious Shradh period and booking the vehicle. But this time, the GST cut came later. We were informed on 15 August, but the new prices came late as late as 10th and 12th, when the Shradh period had already started. So, I feel this would be the best-ever day for a Navratri booking day. So we got a lot of bookings yesterday, and obviously the delivery also happened in a major way," Gulati explained.

Maruti Delivers 25,000 Cars In A Day

While Mahindra celebrated booking records, Maruti Suzuki focused on delivery execution on first day of Navratri, achieving what is the most successful single-day automotive sales performance in recent history.

According to Partho Banerjee, Senior Executive Officer, Maruti Suzuki, the company has not seen such a response in more than three decades.

“The response from customers has been phenomenal -- something we haven’t seen in the last 35 years. On the very first day, we recorded 80,000 enquiries, and have already delivered over 25,000 cars, with deliveries expected to touch 30,000 shortly. 

Since 18th September, when we announced additional price reduction (over and above GST), we have received 75,000 bookings, with nearly 15,000 bookings coming in every day -- about 50per cent higher than usual. Demand for small cars has been especially strong, with bookings growing by nearly 50per cent. Enquiries remain very high, and we may even run out of stock for certain variants. Dealers are staying open late into the night to deliver cars to customers. Compared to last year, the overall response has been exceptionally strong," Banerjee added.

The surge in consumer interest comes as welcome news for India's passenger vehicle sector, which has faced challenges over the past several months. Throughout the current financial year, the industry has experienced lacklustre performance with minimal growth, leading to initial annual growth estimates of just 1-4 per cent.