Honda Siel Cars India (HSCI), the Indian arm of the Japanese automobile manufacturer Honda is considering discontinuing the sales of its premium sedan Civic owing to dwindling sales of the car model in the Indian car market. The absence of a diesel option with the sedan has taken its toll on its sales in the auto market due to the shift of demand from petrol powered cars to diesel cars.
In the month of July 2012, the company sold 138 units of the Civic sedan in comparison to 233 units sold in the month in 2011. According to Mr. Jnaneswar Sen Senior Vice-President (Marketing and Sales) HSCI, the company will be introducing a new generation diesel version of the car model in India which has already been launched globally in 2011.
The Civic sedan is among the car models sales of which have suffered due to the wide gap between the prices of petrol and diesel as a result of frequent hikes in petrol prices in India. The sales of petrol cars models in India have been declining while demand for diesel cars has been growing stronger.