[volkman10]

For the first time in 40 years, India’s largest-selling car did not carry the Maruti Suzuki logo. Punch, the subcompact SUV from Tata Motors, edged out Maruti Suzuki’s Wagon R and Swift to become the country's largest-selling car in 2024.

Tata Motors sold over 2.02 lakh units of Tata Punch in 2024, overtaking the Wagon R, which sold 1.91 lakh units.

What is telling is that three out of the top five selling cars in the country were SUVs. Within the segment, Maruti Suzuki Ertiga – the number 1 SUV brand of 2023 – slipped to number 4.



In 2024, when the Indian industry reached another peak of about 42.86 lakh car sales in the post-pandemic era, Maruti’s market share not only fell to 41%, but had also lost the distinction of supplying India's best-selling car.




Source:

[V.Narayan]

As a consumer great to hear this. Maruti has held the nos 1 position since circa 1985 or 1986, that is quite a run. Must compliment Maruti for that. But in these 40 odd years the Indian consumer has changed especially that ill defined middle class Indian. His and her buying power is 4X to 10X greater than the equivalent in 1985. The consumer no longer is happy with a car built on the bare bones Ford T model philosophy. He/she desires features, wants performance, is conscious of safety and is more discerning than the average Joe buyer of 4 decades ago. Tata understood this. Maruti will need to up their game and offer more car for the buck and a better status image for the Wagon R.

All told we the consumer win.

Go Tata Go.

[Scarlet_Rider]

Happy to see Tata at the top! And this is coming from a former 800 and current Baleno owner. Tata should now really focus on the service side of things if they want to hold on to the position. We have enough threads on the forum with horror stories of their service. As fellow members had mentioned on these threads, there is no point in having a car with 5 star safety rating if it is not backed up with proper service and reliability.

[theAutomaniac]

Kudos to Tata Motors for achieving this feat. The Indica came close to overthrowing the 800 in 2002 but failed by a whisker, and Punch today has done that successfully. The Punch is a good all rounder as a family car where long term reliability and refinement is still a drawback, but it pulls back by providing an ego boost to the owner due to its bulky design, and a tall and cool looking boxy design. This will be a wake up call for Maruti and Hyundai to do better in terms of safety.

Hopefully this success also motivates Tata Motors to finally improve the service network, and develop a solution for the uneven panel gaps, long term rattle & rust, and random issues like shutting down of lights etc.

[It's Magic]

Originally Posted by volkman10

For the first time in 40 years, India’s largest-selling car did not carry the Maruti Suzuki logo. Punch, the subcompact SUV from Tata Motors, edged out Maruti Suzuki’s Wagon R and Swift to become the country's largest-selling car in 2024.

It's great news and a big achievement for Tata.

Tata Punch had been at the top spot for most of the year, and it was just a few months ago that it fell behind others. It ticks most of the boxes for the average customer and offers a well-rounded package. It was a deserving candidate to end the year as the number one seller.

However, Tata Punch still lacks a diesel engine, and if Tata decides to introduce it, it will boost its sales even further.

Tata still has a big task ahead. As they say, 'With great power comes great responsibility.' They need to work on their shortcomings, especially related to service and reliability.

[ruzbehxyz]

Tata motors has come a long way. Along with features, the Indian customer is also now focusing on safety of the car, especially build quality. This is exactly where Tata shines. But what does Tata really need now ? It’s the service. Tata really need to pull their socks up by providing trustable service.

[zeus18]

Maruti failed to market Ignis aggressively. It didn't update it from time to time and was given upon the product.

Ignis will be replaced with a punch rival this year or the next year by Maruti/ Suzuki.

[Carma2017]

Punch being number 1 is not a very good result for TATA. It is a fact that higher sticker price cars generally generate higher profits compared to lower priced ones. The Nexon was TATA's highest selling car. Having to cede that position to Punch means, within TATA lineup, profitability dips.

Taking nothing away from Punch, let's see the Q4 FY25-26 dispatches, i have a feeling it will drop as TATA dispatched more cars as it wanted the nunero uno position. Of course having very good sales since the refresh set it up for the numero uno position.

[Rajeevraj]

Good work by Tata in taking the top seller rank from Maruti. Having said that, 3 of the top 5 still belong to Maruti and even after all these years Maruti still sells 3 times more than everyone else. That too without bringing in any revolutionary product or technology. The Wagon R, Swift, Ertiga, Baleno, Brezza, Fronx ,Dzire continue to rule the market.

Not meaning to support Maruti or downplay the efforts of others, the point is that even with all the fantastic work Tata is doing along with Hyundai,Kia, Mahindra- the progress against Maruti has been painfully slow. That trust is so deeply embedded in the Indian customer and Maruti does enough to retain it.

Hope this is a small but significant step in Tata and others really taking the fight to Maruti.

[ritedhawan]

Its very difficult to believe that Maruti Suzuki got overthrown from its top spot. I think, Maruti Suzuki set up Arena to differentiate the taxi buyer customer base from the usual customer for which it set up Nexa. However, the taxi segment association with the brand has rubbed off its sheen , to the peril of the usual customer. The taxi segment taps on Tour M Dzire and Wagon R. The new swift, new Dzire, are there but I dont see them often on roads. Its still hard to believe, that Maruti Suzuki got dethroned by Tata Motors esp. when on the scale of after-sales service the difference is substantial. Additionally, with no eletric vehicle to offer and for full hybrid they rely on spun-off products from thier Japanese counterpart Toyota. The rebadging of Toyota products with little changes-- this goes both ways for Maruti Suzuki and Toyota-- However, how much it affects Toyota, only time will tell. One remembers, Tata Motors was once identified with taxi segment in the days of Tata Indica, Indigo..etc. They did well to get rid of that impression.

[theabstractmind]

If you consider Baleno, Fronx, Taisor and Glanza as the same car, which they are - nearly, Baleno is the best seller. I think they sell about 35000 units per month of these clones.

Anyways, great to see Tata on the top.

[Nithesh_M]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

3 of the top 5 still belong to Maruti and even after all these years Maruti still sells 3 times more than everyone else. That too without bringing in any revolutionary product or technology. The Wagon R, Swift, Ertiga, Baleno, Brezza, Fronx ,Dzire continue to rule the market.

Very much this. Maruti cannibalising its own products in one price bracket is the reason for this.

Ignis, Celerio, Swift, Wagon R, Spresso, Dzire, Fronx, Baleno all compete amongst themselves in the same price range of 5 to 10 lakh rupees more or less and gives a lot more options to a buyer. When i walked into a Suzuki dealership last year to check out options for my Father in law to replace his 2010 Alto k10, I was surprised to see how each product in the Arena showroom was priced closely amongst each other.

You are getting drastically different vehicles for a mere difference of 30 to 40k rupees starting from the Alto-Spresso-Celerio-Ignis-Swift-Baleno-Fronx-Brezza.

You could walk in to buy a base Alto for 5 lakh but you will easily convince yourself to double your budget and walk out with Baleno or a Swift at 10lakhs.

We stepped into the dealership and ditched the Alto and Spresso right away since my 6ft 3 big frame struggles to get into and out of them. We looked at the Celerio and the wagon R but were sat wondering if my fil cannot directly buy the Swift at 10lakhs OTR.

We tried to convince him for a Punch EV but he has had enough Tata troubles in his close knit community that he has swore off the brand. This was the same man who wanted to buy an Indica in the mid 2000s but settled for an Alto instead.

[Sensible_Speed]

Originally Posted by ritedhawan

Its very difficult to believe that Maruti Suzuki got overthrown from its top spot. I think, Maruti Suzuki set up Arena to differentiate the taxi buyer customer base from the usual customer for which it set up Nexa. However, the taxi segment association with the brand has rubbed off its sheen , to the peril of the usual customer. The taxi segment taps on Tour M Dzire and Wagon R. The new swift, new Dzire, are there but I dont see them often on roads. Its still hard to believe, that Maruti Suzuki got dethroned by Tata Motors esp. when on the scale of after-sales service the difference is substantial. Additionally, with no eletric vehicle to offer and for full hybrid they rely on spun-off products from thier Japanese counterpart Toyota. The rebadging of Toyota products with little changes-- this goes both ways for Maruti Suzuki and Toyota-- However, how much it affects Toyota, only time will tell. One remembers, Tata Motors was once identified with taxi segment in the days of Tata Indica, Indigo..etc. They did well to get rid of that impression.

Remember, it is the taxi sales that are keeping the sub-4m sedan market alive. The new Swift and Dzire have started to show up quite frequently in Bangalore, where I live. Maruti is still doing a fantastic job in terms of sales. It is just the one model (maybe two, including the Nexon) from Tata that appeals to consumers. Everyone else are still buying Maruti because they offer a better overall experience. What I would like to see is a proliferation of car sales into lesser penetrated markets (rural mostly). The cities are completely clogged and to access rural markets, I firmly believe that Maruti has the strongest line-up of cars.

[jetsetgo08]

Firstly, kudos to TML, the base variants of Punch are sheer value for money.

However, Maruti has shot themselves on the foot by leapfrogging prices of the A and B1 segment hatchbacks beyond 6L. In my opinion a 1.0L Wagon R, S-Presso, Celerio or Alto at Rs.6-7L is not worth it. Except the engine refinement and mileage, Punch base variants are better in almost every aspect.

However, I believe MSIL is making fat profits on the B2 segment 1.2L versions when looked at as an aggregate.

[adityaNview]

Congratulations to TATA for this marvellous achievement.

Maruti definitely needs to do a review of its own product line. Their products are competent, but never the best.

It took them too long to launch a safe vehicle.
They are still using the same old engine and gearbox combination, well mostly.

There is no novelty factor here.

As a consumer, we swore by Maruti. But with the new generation, other brands are proving more effective in marketing themselves.