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KARACHI: After increase in prices by two leading Japanese car assemblers, Honda Atlas Cars Pakistan Limited has also raised prices by Rs20,000-30,000 on different models.
An official of the firm said price of Honda City has been raised by Rs20,000 while Honda Civic will cost Rs30,000 more. The new prices would be effective from Jan 7.
The official linked the price-hike to rupee devaluation against major currencies, especially Japanese yen.
The company has already suspended its production of Civic and City cars from the first week of December 2011 and hopefully till the last week of January 2012 owing to disruption in supply of parts from Thailand.
On Dec 9, 2011 the Indus Motor Company, the assemblers of Toyota Corolla and Daihatsu cars, had raised the prices by 1.5 per cent followed by increase of Rs15,000-25,000 in prices of various Suzuki cars and pickups from Jan 1, 2012, on currency fluctuations.
Irrespective of economic and political tensions and high prices of cars, customers have been actively buying both locally assembled and used imported cars in larger numbers thanks to rising farm income and huge arrival of home remittances.
However, assemblers fear decline in demand of locally assembled cars as government has banned the import of kits and cylinders last month.
Car sales figures of December 2011 and January 2012 will give a real picture of demand and sales of locally made cars.
