Curated By: Business Desk
Last Updated: September 11, 2023, 12:18 IST
Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata started a trading company at the age of 29.
The founder of Tata Group started his business with just a capital of Rs 21,000 and began his first expedition to England, where he learnt about the textile business.
Ratan Tata, Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani are some of the leading businessmen in India. Their stories are different from one another but each one is motivating and inspiring in its own way. To motivate you amid Monday Blues, let’s walk down to the history of the Tata Group, the largest industrial giant with a market value of around Rs 24 lakh crore.
The year 1868 will always remain special in the history of the Tata Group as it was the year when Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata started a trading company at the age of 29.
The city of Jamshedpur in Jharkhand is named after him. The founder of Tata Group started his business with just a capital of Rs 21,000 and began his first expedition to England, where he learnt about the textile business. Jamsetji was assured that there was a huge scope for Indian companies to make a dent in the prevailing British dominance of the textile industry.
He moved into textiles in 1869 and acquired a dilapidated and bankrupt oil mill in Chinchpokli in the industrial heart of Bombay. He strategically renamed the property Alexandra Mill and converted it into a cotton mill.
After two years, he sold the mill for a significant profit to a local cotton merchant. Jamestji Tata then visited England and did an exhaustive study of the Lancashire cotton trade. The quality of men, machinery and products that he saw during the break was impressive. He also believed that he could take his learning and be shoulder to shoulder with colonial masters that they had rigged to their advantage, according to the Tata Group.
The Empress Mills was established in Nagpur in 1877 which was a daring initiative that turned the widely held belief of Bombay being the centre of the textile industry. Jamestji dedicated his life to constructing a world-class academic organisation, an iron and steel company and generating hydroelectric power from the 1880s till his death in 1904.
Jamsetji’s steel project did face many hurdles but due to his steadfast resolve and the dedication of his heirs, Dorabji Tata and Ratanji Tata, the Tata Iron and Steel company was finally established in 1912, eight years after Jamsetji’s demise.
To assist Indian students seeking higher education overseas, he also launched the JN Tata Endowment Fund, a program which continued to inspire young minds. He also brought an Indian dream to reality by building the Taj Mahal Hotel which is a now huge chain of luxury hotels in India and around the globe.
Jamestji Tata’s son Dorabji Tata assumed the responsibility for carrying out the expansive plan for India after his father’s death in 1904 and was elected as the Chairman of the Tata Group assuring that the tradition of advancement and generosity would continue.
