Disappointment with polity leading to change: Rajiv Bajaj

He also discussed the December sales number for Bajaj Auto.

Below is the transcript of the interview.

Q: From the many things the Prime Minister said, [indications are] the diesel price hike that has been announced over the past several months of 50 paise a month will be discontinued as well the number of subsidized LPG cylinders would increase. Do you rejoice or are you indifferent to it?

A: They are caused to rejoice today and tomorrow, but in the long-term they give you depression. So directionally I would say that all subsidies are wrong.

I have never been one for gasoline or diesel to be subsidised or electric vehicles to be subsidised or anything else, this scrap-and-replace schemes etc.

I think fundamentally all subsidies are wrong. They tell us that there is something fundamentally amiss that needs to be fixed and if we postpone the harder decisions we do it only to our own peril in the long run.

Q: The thing we got from the Prime Minister's speech was that he is not going to attempt or throw himself as a candidate for Prime Ministership if the UPA were to win. That is increasingly becoming a big if anyways, but as a businessman do you think you are staring at some uncertainty about the future or do you think things will in fact be better after the elections?

A: I think there is enough reason to believe that after the crisis comes the resolution. So I think what we are seeing in recent weeks or recent months is a build up of a positive crisis as opposed to a situation where everything seemed dead, at least there is some energy around us now.

At least there are alternatives people are thinking about. At least there is a catalyst in there that is stirring up the reaction. So I think it is a positive and a very good signal.

Q: Talking about your auto sales number for the month of December, what about the domestic market as a whole? Was it again production constraints and even an annual shutdown which affected sales?

A: You are quite right on all those counts. The month of December and the third quarter went off more or less exactly as I have been saying for the last three months. Total sales for December were approximately 300,000 vehicles, about 37,000 three wheelers and the balance were motorcycles.

We have posted very well with double-digit growth and as I have been saying domestic motorcycle has been a drag for us and I heard that it would continue to be so in November and December for the reasons you mentioned, so I am not going to repeat them.

I think from January onwards, our domestic sales will speak for themselves. That is as far as Bajaj Auto is concerned. As far as industry goes, I will say this that although it appears as if the domestic motorcycle industry as a whole has sold a little over 800,000 motorcycles last month, but if you speak with all the major makers i.e. Hero MotoCorp, Honda and ourselves you will come to the conclusion that retail sales were closer to 600,000.

So it has been in that sense a very difficult December where manufacturer has pushed lot of stock into dealership and all that will show up clearly as we go through January.