new delhi automobile manufacturers are making their products increasingly womanfriendly as they seek to become more attractive to the fairer sex a category that is becoming a driving force behind vehicle sales in india from small cars such as the renault kwid and maruti alto to luxury sedans and suvs from the likes of mercedesbenz and bmw women are buying passenger vehicles across segments as they become financially independent and empowered to make decisions the trend is visible more in urban markets in the past five years the percentage of women among car buyers has nearly doubled to 1012 per cent from about 6 per cent industry executives said carmakers have recognised this opportunity and are eager to provide the comforts their discerning female customers look for such as clutchless transmission rear parking cameras electronically foldable mirrors and navigation options even in small cars earlier cars used to be registered in the name of the father or the husband as homemakers had difficulties accessing bank loans said sumit sawhney managing director renault india with more and more women working and gaining financial independence this trend is changing while about 15 per cent of the demand for renaults kwid is from women at maruti the countrys largest car maker as much as 11 per cent of sales across brands is to women and the company expects that number to grow as women expand their roles in different professions gain financial independence and empowerment we foresee car ownership going up said rs kalsi executive director for marketing and sales at maruti suzuki this confidence also comes from the fact that several enablers are in place banks are offering womanspecial loans manufacturers like us are offering special technologies like auto gear shift driving training by women trainers and even expanding into womanspecial accessories while the number of women buying cars has increased the average age of the female buyer has reduced according to data available with maruti as much as 41 per cent of its female customers are aged less than 35 years compared with 35 per cent five years ago the number of women taking car loans has increased to 76 per cent from 69 per cent over the same period maruti sees the launch of auto gear shift technology in its cars as one of the reasons for its success with women as much as 41 per cent of its sales of the alto wagonr celerio and dzire all these models offer automatic or automated manual transmission options comes from female buyers also kalsi said women are increasingly buying larger vehicles for instance 115 per cent of ertiga utility vehicle sales is to women perhaps they like to move in groups with families or children he said at hyundai india 1517 per cent of sales is to women though an estimated 2530 per cent of the vehicles sold by it is used by women said rakesh srivastava senior vicepresident for sales and marketing most of our woman