Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi will be on a five-day tour to Japan from Sunday to expand business ties with that country and will also meet auto major Maruti Suzuki's top brass, official sources said.

Maruti Suzuki on Tuesday said its Japanese parent Suzuki Motor Corporation's stake in the company will go up to 56.2 per cent following merger of Suzuki Powertrain with India's largest carmaker.

"The

Japanese small car major Suzuki Motor Corporation is considering to launch electric vehicles in India, although it sees infrastructure as a big challenge.

With the demand of diesel cars very high in

Suzuki Motor Corp and estranged partner Volkswagen seemed headed for arbitration, after VW refused again to sell its 20 per cent stake back to the Japanese carmaker and put a floundering two-year alliance out of its misery.

Months of squabbling that has brought Volkswagen to the brink of divorce with Japan's Suzuki will dampen its growth prospects in Asia and have a negative credit effect on Europe's biggest carmaker, cr

Suzuki Motor Corp accused Volkswagen of breaching a partnership pact by withholding hybrid technology it promised to share, pushing their two-year-old alliance to the brink of disintegration.

Japan's

Volkswagen could make a move to take over Japan's Suzuki, German magazine Der Spiegel reported, citing an unnamed senior manager at VW.

"I do not rule out this possibility," the weekly quoted the per

Suzuki Motor is likely to locate a planned $1.3 billion passenger car factory in Gujarat, Japan's Kyodo news agency said on Wednesday, as the automaker looks to expand capacity in its key market.

The

German auto giant Volkswagen said on Monday it had no plans to end its cooperation with Japanese partner Suzuki, even though Suzuki has decided to pull out of the two-year-old alliance.

"We're still