Maruti Suzuki plans price hike in January

BENGALURU (Reuters) - India's top carmaker Maruti Suzuki said on Friday it planned to increase the price of its vehicles in January, prompted by continued cost pressure due to inflation and recent regulatory requirements.

India's annual retail inflation eased to a three-month low of 6.77% in October, but has remained stubbornly above the 6% upper limit of the Reserve Bank of India's tolerance band.

Meanwhile, the country has mandated automakers to comply with stricter fuel efficiency norms from April 2023, aimed at reducing carbon emissions.

"While the company makes maximum effort to reduce cost and partially offset the increase, it has become imperative to pass on some of the impact through a price increase," the company said in a statement, adding that the hike would vary across models.

Maruti, which has about 40% market share in India's passenger vehicle market, did not say how much it planned to raise prices by.

(Reporting by Rama Venkat in Bengaluru; Editing by Nivedita Bhattacharjee)