MUMBAI, Aug. 27 -- Maruti Suzuki's quarterly production record almost went unnoticed. In the three months ended June 30, 2026, India's largest automaker dispatched more than 500,000 passenger vehicles to dealers - a number the company had never crossed in a single quarter - yet its shares barely moved on the day the data emerged. What the market was watching instead was the margin line, and what it saw there was less comfortable.

The passenger vehicle industry as a whole shipped approximately 1.13 million units in Q1 FY27, according to data compiled from Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers filings, a 9.4 percent increase from the year-earlier quarter. The headline looks clean. Below it, the sector is splitting.

Mahindra's 28.6 pe...