The purpose of a sunroof is for ventilation and air circulation, and not recreation, experts reiterate. Last week, a six-year-old boy in Bengaluru suffered minor injuries while sticking his head out of the sunroof of a moving car. The video, showing the boy’s head colliding against an overhead metal barrier, went viral on social media.
“Putting one’s head through the sunroof is strictly illegal and stringent action will be taken against offenders,” Karthik Reddy, joint commissioner of police (traffic), said, citing the recent case. The cops registered a suo moto case under Section 281 (rash and negligent driving) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
As per numbers shared by some car dealerships Metrolife spoke to, cars with sunroofs are popular with families, however not all customers choose the car for the feature. “We have two top-end cars that come with a sunroof. We sell about 18-20 of these on average per month. However, the sunroof feature is not the selling point. It is usually other features, found in the more premium models, that convince customers to buy the car,” says Nagayya S M, who works at a Maruti Suzuki car dealership in Koramangala. The cars start at Rs 12 lakh.
Ajay Singh, director of sales and marketing at Advait Hyundai, shares that about 1,000 cars are sold per month across his dealerships in Karnataka. “Of these, about 80% are SUVs with sunroofs. A majority of the buyers are families with kids,” he notes. He adds that 60% of customers come in looking for a car with a sunroof, and about 40% end up buying one.
When Ashish V, a software professional based in Electronics City, bought an SUV in 2021, it was more for its “five-star safety ratings”. The sunroof was an added bonus. He uses the sunroof when the car has been parked under direct sunlight for too long, or when it gets too hot inside the car. “Safety is a major concern, given the condition of the roads in our city. So I do not allow my 10-year-old daughter to put her head through it. But even if that weren’t the case, I would not allow it,” he explained.
A sunroof does not enhance the design of a car in any way, points out Pratap Jayaram, a motorsport engineer who has designed a number of electric vehicles, such as Reva and Mahindra e2o. In cars manufactured earlier, there was an opening that you had to tilt to let the sun in. It didn’t budge beyond 30 degrees or so, so one could not really put their head through it. Now, the design has evolved to be fully open. “A sunroof is strictly to let in sunlight or air. At night, one can enjoy a view of the sky and the stars. But it is definitely not for sticking your head or body out of it,” says Jayaram.