Ratan Tata Age, Death, Girlfriend, Wife, Children, Family, Biography

Some Lesser Known Facts About Ratan Tata

• Did Ratan Tata smoke?: No ^[7]The Guardian

• Did Ratan Tata drink alcohol?: No ^[8]The Guardian

• Ratan Tata was a name to reckon with in the annals of Tata Group’s business. Although he was one of the most influential businessmen in India, he was best known for his simplicity and loneliness, and the words used most often to describe Ratan Tata are ‘shy’ and ‘loner.’

• During his 21 years of tenure as the Chairman of Tata Group (1991-2012), revenues grew over 40 times, and profit, over 50 times.

• Ratan Tata, in many ways, was an accidental millionaire. He was, in fact, a gifted interloper, who, even after heading one of the biggest business conglomerates in India, lived an ordinary life and shunned the media spotlight. This quiet and humble Indian business tycoon drove himself to work in a Tata sedan.

• Ratan Tata belongs to a family that has had everything but children. Traditionally, Parsee priests, the Tata Family got its recognition when Jamsetji Tata opened a textile mill in 1868. Strikingly, it offered workers pensions and paid accident compensation, facilities, which were nowhere in the scene in the Indian business sector.
  

  A Textile Mill opened by Jamsetji Tata in the late 19th century

• Although the Tatas had built up a formidable business by 1971, the family was running out of heirs.

• Ratan’s father, Naval H Tata was born into an ordinary family in Surat. Naval’s parents died when he was too young; leaving him to be raised at an orphanage, but Naval was destined to win life’s lottery at 13. Naval was adopted by Lady Navajbai Tata (Tata’s formidable matriarch); who had been left childless and widowed at 40. Thereafter, Naval rose to become the deputy chairman of the Tata Group.
  

  Ratan Tata (R) with his father Naval (L) and Half Brother Noel (Centre)

• Ratan was, in fact, a Tata by birth; as his biological maternal grandmother was the sister of Hirabai Tata, wife of group founder Jamsetji Tata. Moreover, his biological grandfather, Hormusji Tata, also belonged to the broader Tata Family.

• Unlike the Ratan Tata’s lifestyle of an ordinary person in his later life, he spent his childhood in luxury; as he grew up at Tata Palace, a white Baroque revival-style building in the centre of Mumbai; attended by a crew of 50 servants. Reportedly, Ratan was driven to school in a Rolls-Royce.

• While growing up, Ratan became very close to his grandmother, Lady Navajbai Tata. While talking about his grandmother in an interview, he said,
  

  I owe a great deal to my grandmother who brought up my brother and me. She instilled in us what she considered to be proper, And I think that has had a very profound influence on me and my value systems.”

  

  Lady Navajbai Tata

• Ratan Tata’s fascination for America led him there to study architecture at Cornell University. While in the United States, Ratan travelled across the country; washing dishes to make ends meet. ^[9]The Guardian
  

  A rare photo of Ratan Tata when he travelled to America in his youth

• In an interview, Ratan admitted falling in love with a young woman in America. Although he said that he had fallen in love as many as four times, the closest one was with that American woman. He said,
  

  Well, you know one was probably the most serious was when I was working in the US and the only reason we didn’t get married was that I came back to India and she was to follow me and that was the year of the, if you like, the Indo-Chinese conflict and in true American fashion this conflict in the Himalayas, in the snowy, uninhabited part of the Himalayas was seen in the United States as a major war between India and China and so, she didn’t come and finally got married in the US thereafter.” ^[10]The Economic Times

• Ratan Tata joined Tata Group in 1961 at Tata Steel, where he was assigned the responsibility of shovelling limestone & handling blast furnace.
  

  Ratan Tata with JRD Tata on the shop floor of TELCO (now, TATA Motors)

• His pragmatic business skills led him to become the Chairman of Tata Group in March 1991; when JRD Tata stepped down as chairman of Tata Sons, naming Ratan his successor.

• Under his stewardship, Tata Group became an international conglomerate, and he got Tata Tea to acquire Tetley, Tata Motors to acquire Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Steel to acquire Corus.

• Before Nano Car came into the business in 2008, Ratan Tata had already gifted India its first indigenous car- the Tata Indica in 1998. In one of his Instagram posts, he wrote about the birth of India’s first Indigenous car-
  

  Everyone told us it couldn’t be done without having a joint venture or a partnership with an international company. That if I did this, I will be linked to failure. But went ahead anyway. There were technical issues and many lessons we learned. It was a wonderful experience to be breaking new ground. The chances to give up were many. We stayed the course, worked out each issue, and that was the birth of India’s first indigenous car- Tata Indica.”

  

  Ratan Tata at the Launch of Tata Indica

• Before Ratan Tata took charge of Tata Group, there was no retirement age in Tata. He drafted a retirement policy in the company and fixed the retirement age for executive and non-executive directors. While talking about this retirement policy in an interview, he said,
  

  One may feel that 65 is too young or 70 is too young or that 75 is too young. Whatever it may be, you don’t need a person to say, look, I think you should leave. So that has been very much behind the thinking of setting a retirement age. There was no retirement age in Tata. I could’ve just as well have stayed up and stayed on.”

• Ratan Tata’s mother tongue was Gujarati. ^[11]Rediff

• Ratan Tata was very affectionate towards dogs and had two pet dogs- Maximus and Tito. Since the days of JRD Tata, the Bombay House (the Headquarters of Tata Sons) has had a tradition of letting stray dogs in during rain. The Bombay House still has a kennel for stray dogs.
  

  Ratan Tata spending quality time with his pet dogs

• On 23 March 2009, he launched his dream car- Tata Nano, and it was considered the world’s cheapest car priced at Rs. 1 lakh.

• He was a trained pilot, and on 8 February 2007, he became the first Indian to fly F-16.

• Although he was a professional architect, he had designed only two houses- his mother’s, and his own beach house off the Arabian Sea.

• When it comes to his closest friends, he gave two names- Amar Bose, who made billions from audio equipment, and conductor Zubin Mehta (a fellow Mumbai Parsee) who lives in the United States.

• What made Ratan Tata outstanding was his social conscience. He preferred fairness over money, and he owned less than 1% of the Tata group.

• In September 2022, Ratan Tata became the trustee of the Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund (PM-CARES) along with KT Thomas, former Supreme Court judge, and Kariya Munda, former Deputy Speaker. ^[12]The Indian Express

• Simi Garewal in a 2011 interview claimed that she and him were in a relationship with one another for some time, but they both decided to part ways later. They, however, remained good friends with one another. In an interview, Simi talked about it and said,
  

  Ratan and I go back a long way. He’s perfection, he’s got a sense of humour, is modest and is the perfect gentleman. Money was never his driving force. He’s not as relaxed in India as he is abroad.”

• On 7 October 2024, he was admitted to the Breach Candy Hospital in Mumbai for a medical checkup after his health worsened.

• After he passed away on 9 October 2024, his mortal remains were taken to the National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) in South Mumbai, where people visited him for the last time.
  

  A photo of an ambulance carrying Ratan Tata’s mortal remains

• He was cremated with state honours on 10 October 2024. His funeral was attended by many popular personalities.

• Despite following Parsi rituals, his body was cremated instead of being placed in the Tower of Silence at Malabar Hill. It was Ratan who chose cremation over sky burial in the tower. ^[13]The Free Press Journal

• On 10 October 2024, Diljit Dosanjh, a popular Punjabi singer and actor, paused his live concert in Germany for a short time and paid tribute to Ratan.

• Later, Simi took to X, where she penned an emotional post for Ratan.

They say you have gone ..
It's too hard to bear your loss..too hard.. Farewell my friend..#RatanTata pic.twitter.com/FTC4wzkFoV

— Simi_Garewal (@Simi_Garewal) October 9, 2024