Tracing my love for SUVs

My fascination with SUVs can be traced back to 1993, when I saw the movie Jurassic Park with the Jeep Wrangler. The open top Jeep Wrangler has been my favorite four wheeler ever since. The way it handles itself in rough terrain, oh I just fell in love with it. The Jeep Wrangler has come in many movies and used in all sorts of action scenes. However, I never liked the long wheel base version of it.

Gradually I got hooked on to the Maruti Suzuki Gypsy when I was a kid and used to see my dad drive it in Manipur. That was an Indian version of the tough Jeep that goes anywhere. And, oh, even in Bourne Supremacy, the Gypsy is driven by Marie through the field when running away from the assassin.

In late 1997, I saw the movie Jurassic park 2, with the Mercedes M class with it's raw power trying to pull the trailers falling off the cliff. That was one heckafa scene. 

In 2006, the movie blood diamond had a scene where a convoy of relief workers gets ambushed and one of the vehicles is a Mitsubishi Pajero carrying Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly and Djimon Housou is also hit. DiCaprio takes over and drives the Pajero out of the ambush. That was another scene where I was awestruck by the handling of the Pajero. (I hate the design of the new Pajero Sport).

It is obvious that when it comes to SUVs , I have always loved the nimble, agile ones. But I can't dismiss the fact that I have also been liking the heavy monstrous ones like the Chevy Tahoe. The main reason being - Most movies and TV series have the Black Suburban / Tahoe as the main SUV for the government agencies. I was never interested in the Hummers or the pickups like the Ford F series, Ranger etc.

In India, the closest match has been the Ford Endeavor and I used to like the older one (shown below), and not the new facelifted one (not worth showing here).


With the Indian public going crazy over SUVs and sales numbers for Renault Duster, Ford Ecosport & Nissan Terrano are a strong indicator of the SUV appetite. I still do not like any of these SUVs. My dad likes the Duster for the imposing stance, which I do acknowledge is fine. I would never be able to enjoy an SUV which does not have a powerful engine. And no, anything around 100HP is not powerful. I need an SUV to have close to 140 BHP. The only SUV under Rs15 Lacs to have power similar to this is the Tata Safari Storme (at 138BHP) or the Mahindra XUV 5OO (at 140BHP).

However, I do not associate these 2 SUVs with the words 'nimble' or 'agile', though I like the fact that they seem like SUVs (and not soft roaders) and come with at least 4X4 option .  Unfortunately the build quality of a Tata or a Mahindra is extremely disappointing.

And ofcourse, I do not find the Duster, Ecosport or the Terrano to be agile either.

The soft roaders (compact SUVs)- Duster, Terrano, Ecosport are the ones that just give you some road presence without actually having any off-road presence. (Forgive me if I do not acknowledge the offloading events organized for Duster owners recently). Let me confess something.. A few years down the line, I might end up buying a soft roader too. With passage of time, I feel that I might not be going for Offroad events - for lack (or unaffordability) of a proper off-road SUV (like a Wrangler) and also lack of that fondness for offloading. It is quite likely that in the last 8 years, the 2014 Auto Expo would be the first one that I would probably skip, despite being in Delhi at that time, a painful realization for me (I always thought of myself as an automobile enthusiast, or at least an amateur automobile enthusiast).

I guess, with passage of time, one loses the interest in those fantasy thoughts that once were there for the younger me. I often wanted to drive an agile (or a strong heavy) SUV over rough terrain. Maybe a few years down the line, I might end up buying an old Pajero

Why or why not to go to the auto EXPO?

From what I gather, people go to the auto EXPO for the following reasons in decreasing order of probability

1. Site seeing activity (sometimes with family and kids).
2. Look at beautiful women
3. Get freebies – like calendars, key chains, posters, carry bags.
4. Do some networking with fellow industry people – (actually a good reason)
5. Look at beautiful cars – (seems like the most logical reason)

My experience starts with a keen interest a few weeks prior to the event turning into a form of attentiveness a day or two before the Auto Expo. Until the last day, I had been unable to arrange the auto expo passes for the Business Hour. As an auto enthusiast, had been visiting the Auto Expo for the last few years, effectively covering the last six expos held in Delhi since I was in 10th standard at school in the year 2002. I love to read about new cars and like to always look at my future purchases or so I thought until I am informed of the price tags of most cars. Hence after that the cars turn in to fantasy cars from an earlier version of dream cards.. A few years back, getting big bright posters was also high on my agenda in order to cover the walls of my room, but this year I was not worried about gathering too many posters.



As the newspapers had reported, traffic jams around Pragati Maidan (the venue for the Expo) were a major headache for people visiting the expo, hence going by the metro was the most sensible option.
My friend Siddharth had arranged business hour passes for both of us. Our visit to the expo had the right mix of preparations and precautions. We had planned our to go on a early Monday morning hoping that people would either be rushing for the offices or be indoors complaining of Monday morning blues more so during the winters. When my friend and I de-boarded the Metro, we soon realized that there was a long queue at the metro station for tickets to the auto expo.


The Business hour entry starts at 10:00AM and the general hour starts at 1:00PM. The Business hour passes that traditionally cost Rs500 and the General hour passes cost Rs200so the general mood is that the business hours session is usually less crowded. The culture that is widely prevalent is that of getting complementary passes from friends, collegues etc who work in the auto industry. With Business hour passes in our hands, we were under the impression that the rush would be bearable. Or so we thought!


Being a Delhiite, I had misjudged my fellow Delhiites. The sad part is the margin of error with which I was mistaken. I was in for a huge shock.




Though we were lucky enough to get a quick entry in the expo premises, we soon realized that we were not the early birds of the autoworms (a term I have coined recently). Some of the halls had relatively manageable crowd density, but the German automakers actually had a houseful. Let me remind the clueless reader, we are still visiting during the business hours, which primarily meant fewer crowds, hence more time for genuine visitors to spend quality time appreciating the work of art and engineering (please pardon my dramatization, I speak from the heart when it comes to cars).

There were about 60-70 people lined up in a queue that stretched about 40 meters right outside the VW hall. We both decided that though VW group under which we would see Skoda and some other brands, we were definitely not in the mood to stand in the queue for such long time. It was quite a disappointment with a realization that we will not be able to see a lot new cars. We decided to move on to the Tri-Star and the famous Beemers hoping to get a glimpse of the new ‘i’ series that was put to use in the latest Mission Impossible. The queue outside that hall scared us more. With puzzled reactions, we checked our wrist watches to verify the time. We were momentarily under the impression that the general hour had started and we had probably spent too much time in the first few halls covering Hyundai, Renault & Nissan. The dials still showed 11:00AM. Not a time that one would associate with rush hour on a weekday.




My friend and I moved on to the next Pavilions covering Toyota, Yamaha, GM, Ford and TATA. We wanted to check-out the new Land Rover Discovery concept. They were worth the detour. The two beautiful LR SUVs along with the future Jaguars show the changing ideology of the JLR brand.

Maybe TATA’s acquisition was exactly what was needed to turn the brand around and give it a image makeover. As my friend had quoted during our visit, “the Jaguar has transitioned from an Old executive or President’s car to a car for the young generation manager”.

Another thing that I noticed was the maddening rush at the Toyota counters. People were crowded around the help desks with visiting cards in their hands to hand over. My curiosity pulled me towards the Toyota desk and I realized that the help desk was giving away some freebies in carry bags in exchange for the visiting cards. I asked one fellow by-stander who had just struggled his way out of the mad queue about what was in the freebie bag. The answer I got from him was, “I don’t know”. I was taken aback and my curiosity struggled with my mental instructions. My mind telling me not to bother and move on, and my curiosity wanted to find out if they were giving away keys to a new Camry or Corolla. I wound not mind standing in the queue for that for sure. I asked the same question about the content of the bag to the next guy who came out of the crowd. The angry response from the fellow informed me that the bag had A poster, a key chain, and a diary. My friend and I simply walked away to look at the Land Cruisers.

A quick lunch followed by the final visit to the Suzuki hall took the clock hands to 12:30PM.
A mere 2.5 hours duration in the expo compared to my 6 hour visit the previous time. A disappointed me tried to find solace in the fact that this year, the cars on display were not really unique. However, this year was meant to showcase the direction in which companies believe that the Indian consumer is having high expectations. Compact SUVs, Minivans, MPVs. Just like the last expo was all about showing the small cars heading to the Indian shores such as Brio, Micra, Liva, Pulse etc.

A recommendation that I would like to put forward to Delhiites is, please visit the Expo at your own peril. If site seeing is the objective, one should go to places in Delhi that are actually meant for site-seeing. Like most Delhiites, even I have not been to historical monuments and heritage sites of our own city.




If looking at pretty ladies and taking their photographs is the objective, go online, you will get lot more photographs and in even smaller attires.




If collecting freebies like posters and key chains is the objective, look at the trade off that you have to make by spending time, effort, energy and money to come to the auto expo and then decide if the posters are actually worth the trade off.




With this, I conclude and I request the Auto expo organizers ACMA, SIAM & CII to continue the tradition of bringing together automaker from the world over to Delhi even if next year onwards I choose to visit the auto expo right from my Bedroom TV or automotive websites.