Srinagar, Aug 17: Despite the economic slump witnessed after the Covid-19 pandemic, the auto market in Kashmir has recorded an unprecedented upsurge in the sale of automobiles with non-commercial vehicles topping the statistical charts.
Notwithstanding the price hike prevalent in the automobile industry, the Kashmir Valley has been driven by robust sales and purchases of non-commercial vehicles in the past few years.
The upsurge in car sales in the valley has fostered a mammoth growth of the car markets in Kashmir, with thousands of new cars hitting the roads of the valley each year.
A cumulative statistical data available with the Regional Transport Office Srinagar revealed the registration of 3,51,633 new cars in Kashmir till March 2023, with Srinagar city topping the list with a mammoth registration of 1,45,293 new cars, followed by district Baramulla having 43,919 new registrations. District Budgam stands third in the list with 29,129 new registrations of private cars.
The data shows that 24,016 new car registrations of private cars were recorded in Kashmir in the year 2022 till March 2023. It revealed that Srinagar recorded the highest registration of 7,686 new cars followed by Baramulla registering 3,482 new private cars. “A total of 51,927 new private cars have been registered in the year 2022 till March 2023 in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir,” the officials at RTO said.
Talking to Rising Kashmir, the Regional Transport Officer Kashmir, Syed Shahnawaz Bukhari said the surging car sales depicted an active role in the economic scenario of the region.
“Car sales are a leading indicator of economic activity. We have seen overall growth in the car market in recent decades in the country, more so in the last decade, despite a temporary slowdown, for example during the Covid,” he said, adding, “Jammu & Kashmir is no exception to this trend; however, this indicates the lack of mass public transport systems at our place also. We will have to take measures to step up the use of public transport and also make it more efficient.”
Bukhari said the growth of the car market in general depends on the growth of the Mass Public Transport System. I would personally encourage PTS which may limit the use of personal cars, he said. “We need to do that as we have limited roads. I believe the future as it appears now belongs to electric cars,” the regional transport officer added.
As the robust car business in the valley is gaining ground, the easily available car loans provided by the banking sector have caused quite a stir in bringing up car sales in the region.
The leading dealers of non-commercial vehicles in Kashmir Valley are of the opinion that there has been an ever-growing demand for new cars entering the markets each year. They said the markets have been up with the sale every year.
“In the past seven months, we have sold over 650 new vehicles while the car market in the valley has always been good enough,” Zahur Ahmad Dar, sales manager at Tata Motors, revealed. He said the sales go up each time a new car hits the market.
Providing more details on the demands of the customers, he said, “At present, Nexon and Punch are touching skies; TIAGO and Altroz are doing reasonably well. We have sold a good number of HARRIER and Safari too.”
