Kia, Honda to hike car prices from April

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Kia India is going to hike car prices by up to three per cent from April 1, 2024 owing to commodity price and input cost hikes. Kia India National Head Sales and Marketing Hardeep Singh Brar said,  “Due to the continuous increase in commodity prices, adverse exchange rate and rising input cost, we are compelled to implement a partial price hike.” Subsequently,  all five vehicles of the South Korea based automotive company will become further costlier from beginning of the next financial year.  Kia India retails Seltos, Sonet, Carens, Carnival and EV6 in India. Few days ago, sighting similar reasons, the Japan based automobile manufacturer, Honda Cars India had also announced vehicle price hikes from April 1, 2024.

According to latest data of industry body Federation of Automobile Dealers Association (Fada), Kia India sold 20,357 units in February 2024 which comprised 6.17 per cent of total passenger vehicle (PV) sales in the country. Seltos is the highest selling model of the company in India followed by Sonet, Carens and Carnival.

From April 1, 2024, not only automobiles of these two companies are going to become costlier, but also, electric two wheelers (E2Ws) in the country are also  going to become costlier. Owing to Centre’s withdrawal of FAME-II incentives in the form of subsidies and implementation of Electric Mobility Promotion Scheme (EMPS) 2024 from the beginning of the next fiscal, credit rating agency, Icra, has anticipated 10 per cent rise in E2Ws.

Currently, under the FAME-II scheme, the Centre gives Rs 10,000 per kilowatt hour, subsidy on E2Ws with a cap of 15 per cent of the ex-factory price. But under EMPS, the government has reduced the subsidy to Rs 5,000 kWh with a cap of Rs 10,000 kWh.