The big-ticket year-ending discounts and the anticipated jump in prices in January pushed car sales in December. Market leader Maruti Udyog's sales increased by 23.7 per cent at 56,985 vehicles in the last month as against 46,079 in the year-ago period.

The sales surge was led by the premium hatchback A+ segment cars - the Alto, Wagon-R, Zen and Swift - which grew by 35.6 per cent on year-on-year basis to 38,461 units (28,367 in the corresponding month last year).

Sales in the C segment - the Omni and Versa - grew 40.6 per cent to 6,523 vehicles in December this year compared with 4,638 vehicles in December last year.

Driven by demand in the rural market, sales of Maruti's entry-level hatchback M-800 grew by a modest 0.5 per cent to 7,289 cars during the month (7,252). However, the premium C segment sedans - Baleno and Esteem - witnessed a fall in sales by 13.5 per cent at 2,127 cars from the year-ago figure of 2,459.

After launching its premium hatchback Chevrolet Aveo UV-A, this month, General Motors recorded an increase of 19.4 per cent at 2,543 units as against 2,163 units during the same period last year. The company sold 1,517 units of the Chevrolet Tavera, 759 units of Aveo and 307 units of its premium sedan Optra.

The company also made an impressive increase of 16 per cent in the calender year by selling 35,823 units as against 30,837 units in 2005.

P Balendran, vice-president, GM India, said: "This year has been memorable for us by three launches - the Aveo, SRV and Aveo U-VA. We have been able to establish the Chevrolet as an fast emerging vehicle brands in India."

In the two-wheeler segment, market leader Hero Honda maintained its lead over others, but had a marginal growth of three per cent. It sold 252,000 units as against 2.45 units in December 2005.

Close rival Bajaj Auto fared much better during the month, registering an increase of 21 per cent selling 187,000 two-wheelers. The figure stood at 154,000 in December last year. The company also sold 27,749 units of three-wheelers as against 18,534 for the same period last year.

"Expecting a trend favouring motorcycles, we are expanding our monthly motorcycle capacity to 3,00,000 units by April 2007. We are also launching Bajaj Kristal DTS-I - the first product from an all-new hi-tech scooter platform - this month to regain the share in the scooter market," said Rajiv Bajaj, managing director, Bajaj Auto.

December 2006 proved to be tough for the third major player in the two-wheeler segment, TVS Motor Company, which reported 14.5 per cent decline in motorcycle sales at 58,756 units. In comparison, it had sold 68,724 units in the same month last year.

The company plans to launch new motorcycles in the next few months in a bid to increase its sales.