Maruti, Shriram in rural car finance deal

New Delhi: India's largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India on Monday signed a financing deal with Shriram Group's financial subsidiary, Shriram City Union Finance, to provide car finance at competitive rates to people residing in semi-urban and rural areas.

Maruti says the tie-up would focus on financing entry-level cars from the Maruti portfolio including, M800, Omni and Alto models. Initially, this facility will be available to buyers in Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh and will subsequently be extended countrywide.

Sriram Finance has allocated an initial Rs1,000 crore to finance Maruti buyers.
The two companies signed an agreement to this effect yesterday Subhasri Sriram, executive director, Shriram City and R S Kalsi, chief general manager (sales) Maruti Suzuki.

"Maruti Suzuki is keen to expand its presence in rural and semi-urban markets," Kalsi said after signing the agreement. "We have the right products and an excellent network across the country to support it. However there is still a lot to do in the direction of finance availability especially beyond metro towns."

Kalsi added that the tie-up with the Shriram Group was a joint initiative of the two companies towards providing a transparent, hassle-free finance options to the company's countryside customers

Sriram said "Shriram City has aggressive plans to enter into four-wheeler financing solutions. At the onset of this association we have allocated Rs1,000 crore for 4-wheeler financing. We look forward to our association with Maruti Suzuki to be of advantage to customers as well as both companies."

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