All Honda cars – City, Civic, Accord and CR-V – costlier now

Honda Siel has increased the prices of its entire range of cars in India. Following the rate fluctuations of Indian Rupee and Japanese Yen against US dollar, the company decided to hike the prices of its mid-size sedan City, upper mid-size sedab Civic and Accord and CR-V crossover SUV.

Photo: New Honda Accord in Inida; V6 to follow soon.

The all-new Honda City launched just a few months back in india has seen its price increased up to 30,000-35000, whereas the Honda Civic prices will now be more by Rs 50,100 to Rs 63,000. The luxury car Accord – yes, the Accord is a luxury car in India – is now pricier by a whooping I lakh rupees. The price of the Honda CR-V, imported into India as a completely built unit (CBU), is now higher by Rs 3.54 lakh.

The company said that the increase is in the range of 4-20 percent. “The rupee has depreciated by over 16% vs USD in the past 8 months. On the other hand, the Japanese Yen has strengthened by 10.5% during this period.” Mr. Jnaneswar Sen, Vice President, Marketing, said, explaining the price increase.

He said that these currency fluctuations resulted in tremendous increase in cost of imports impacting the bottom-lines, but so far, the company had refrained from passing them on to the customer. But it is not possible to absorb the impact any more, he added. These revised prices will be effective from April 1st, 2009 except for Honda Accord which will have the new price tags from March 16th 2009.

These inceased prices, remember, are being announced in the Indian automobile market which has not fully turned around after the lows of November and December 2008. Either, Honda SIEL has no option other than to go with these price hikes – or they are suprememly confident that their cars which have always ruled their segments will continue to do so, and the Honda customer would remain one despite the price rise.