Following the intimation given last month, Maruti Suzuki increased the prices of its cars by up to Rs 10,000 with effect from today.
The price change is applicable “for select models owing to increase in commodity prices and foreign exchange rates etc,” said the automaker, which accounts for about 50% of the cars sold in the country.
“The price change varies across models and ranges up to Rs 10,000, ex-showroom in Delhi. The new prices are effective from 10th January 2019,” it added.
It was in December that the company announced that prices rises are coming in January.
“Over the past year, the cost of company’s vehicles has been impacted adversely due to increase in commodity prices and foreign exchange rates, etc,” it said last month.
“Hence, it has become imperative for the company to pass on some impact of the above additional cost to customers through a price increase across various models in January 2019.”
Prices of commodities like steel increased in the first half of 2018, but have fallen off the highs since.
Steel was priced at around 4,200 yuan per ton at the beginning of 2018, and rose to around 4,770 by October.
Since then, most of the global commodities have seen a price correction, and steel was at 3,798 yuan per ton when Maruti announced that it would hike prices.
Similarly, aluminium prices have been on the rise since hitting rock bottom towards the end of 2015 at around $1,450 per ton.
They rose to a record $2,550 in early 2018, but have also been on the decline since then. Currently, aluminium prices were at around $1,973 per ton.
Part of the reason for the steep decline in commodity prices in recent weeks has been been the threat of trade wars between the US and China.