The term “Automobile” is applied to any self-propelled vehicle powered by an Internal combustion engine & designed to transport passengers and goods over roads and highways. Development :
- At present, India has above 40 million passenger vehicles.
- More than 3.7 million Automotive vehicles are produced annually, making the country the second fastest growing automobile market in the world after China.
- According to the society of Indian automobile manufacturers, annual vehicles sales are projected to increase to 4 million by 2015.
Location Factors:
The main factors favour the growth of automobiles industry are:
- Large supply of Iron & Steel, wood, glass, aluminium and fuels.
- Highly skilled labour.
- High degree of scientific and engineering skill.
- Large amount of capital.
- A large home market.
Distribution :
- Mumbai, Chennai, Jamshedpur, Jabalpur and Kolkata are the chief centres of automobile Industry.
- These centres produce almost all sorts of vehicles including trucks, buses, passengers, three wheelers and two wheelers.
- Motor cycles are also manufactured at Faridabad and Mysore.
- Scooters are also manufactured at Lucknow, Satara, Pune, Kanpur & Odhav (Ahmedabad district).
Production :
- In 2012-13, Automobile industry of India produced 20.6 million vehicles.
- India is the largest producer of two wheelers.
