New Delhi, July 1: Sales of Maruti Suzuki India and Tata Motors — two of the country’s largest car makers — fell in June as rising loan rates and price hikes continued to hurt demand.

Mahindra and Mahindra was the only homegrown auto company, which reported a 29 per cent jump in sales last month because of higher demand for its utility vehicles and the Verito sedan.

Hyundai Motor also reported a rise in sales in June.

“We are happy with the 29 per cent growth that we have clocked in June, given the pressures of increasing interest rates and commodity prices,” said Rajesh Jejurikar, chief executive (automotive division) at M&M.

Domestic demand for new vehicles has been affected by rising inflation, which forced auto makers to raise prices. Besides this, the Reserve Bank of India has raised its lending rate by 2.75 percentage points since March 2010, prompting customers to defer purchases. Rising fuel costs have also acted as a deterrent.

Total sales at Maruti fell 9 per cent to 80,298 vehicles in June from 88,091 a year earlier — the steepest fall since a 10 per cent decline in December 2008. However, part of the decline was on account of the company losing more than 10 production days because of a strike at its Manesar factory that caused a production loss of 12,600 vehicles. The company also stopped work at its Manesar and Gurgaon factories in Haryana for six days each for maintenance.

Local sales dropped 4 per cent to 70,020 vehicles, while exports slumped 33 per cent to 10,278 vehicles, said the Indian unit of Japan-based Suzuki Motor Corp.

Tata Motors said local sales of its cars and SUVs fell 21 per cent to 21,993 units in June. It sold 5,451 units of the Nano locally, down 29 per cent from a year earlier. Total vehicle sales, including trucks and buses, at Tata Motors fell 1 per cent to 66,358 units.

Sales at Mahindra, however, rose 29 per cent to 35,584 vehicles. Local sales also grew 29 per cent to 33,772, helped by a higher demand for its upgraded Verito sedan and the Scorpio and Xylo utility vehicles. The company sold 16,053 utility vehicles and Veritos during the month, up 21 per cent from a year earlier.

Hyundai Motor’s local unit said sales in June rose 14 per cent to 52,531 units, helped partly because of a higher demand for its Fluidic Verna sedan.

The company has received bookings of more than 21,000 Vernas. Local sales rose 17 per cent to 22,129 vehicles, while exports rose 11 per cent to 30,402 vehicles.

“The market continued to be slow but Hyundai sales have grown partially because of the success of the new Verna,” said Arvind Saxena, director (marketing and sales), at Hyundai Motor India.

Two-wheeler makers zoomed past cars to report strong sales in June. Hero Honda Motors posted a 20 per cent growth in sales at 512,244 units against 426,454 units in the same period last year.

Yamaha Motor India registered a growth of 30 per cent in sales at 36,595 units against 28,155 units a year ago.