New Delhi, Oct. 14: After a lull in June and July, passenger car sales have started picking up in the domestic market.

As many as 77,411 cars were sold last month, up 9.7 per cent from 70,507 units sold in September last year. The August figures this year were also higher on a month-on-month basis showing that the sales of passenger cars have increased for the second consecutive month.

This is essentially because big players like Maruti and Hyundai registered higher sales on the back of launches and price-cuts.

While Maruti saw sales of its cars jump 15.8 per cent to 40,047 units, the growth for Hyundai was 22 per cent at 14,283 units.

The rise in car sales was unabated even during the Shradh period which is considered inauspicious for new purchases. A Maruti official said customers continued to make bookings but delayed taking deliveries. “Customers chose to cash in on the attractive discounts offered by the companies, to beat the slack demand during the period,” he said.

Car sales in the first half of this fiscal were, however, subdued at 4,09,570 units, a growth of 6.14 per cent over 3,85,877 units in the corresponding period last year.

On the two-wheeler front, overall sales, including scooters and mopeds, were up by 20.4 per cent in September at 6,55,210 units against 5,44,124 units in the same month last year. Motorcycles continued to witness high double digit growth with sales rising 25.8 per cent to 5,38,889 units in September 2005 compared with 4,28,036 units in the same month last year. Segment leaders Hero Honda and Bajaj Auto accounted for the majority of the numbers.

Bike sales saw a healthy 20.49 per cent growth at 27,04,418 units for the first six months of the current financial year against 22,44,596 units in the same period last year.

While moped sales last month declined to 26,455 units (27,532), scooters just about managed to stay positive, rising 1.4 per cent to 89,866 units (88,556).

As for the commercial vehicles segment, sales were up 14.3 per cent in September at 31,737 units against 27,766 units in the year-ago period. The sales of medium and heavy commercial vehicles were, however, subdued. The light commercial vehicle sales grew 32.5 per cent to 13,188. The September numbers for medium and heavy vehicles stood at 18,549 units, up 4.12 per cent.