Ratan Tata – A tribute to the man

As we mourn the passing of an icon of India's industrial might, our editor, Yogendra Pratap pens his thoughts about Mr Tata, who helped shape the automotive industry as we know it today.

I first met Mr Ratan Tata even before I had started my career as an automotive journalist. As a young editor of a small business magazine called India Global Watch, I had gone to cover a joint press conference of one of the Tata Group companies announcing some sort of intent to do business with Raytheon at one of the Taj hotels in the capital. This would have been in the mid-1990s and Mr Tata had flown in from Mumbai to make the announcement and address the journalists. I tried to put in a request for an interview with him, but that was declined due to the paucity of time as he was supposed to be flying back right after the PC.

I presumed they had no time for the young editor of an inconsequential magazine, but as a fearless youth, I waylaid him as he left the banquet hall and despite one of his entourage trying to shoo me away, he engaged in a conversation with me. Asked me about my publication, what we were trying to do and also promised me a full-fledged interview that I could schedule for whenever I was in Mumbai next. He got someone from his entourage to give me the direct number to his personal assistant before he got into the car to be whisked away to the airport. I managed to ask him the couple of questions that I wanted to on the brisk walk from the banquet hall to the car and got a peek into the character of the man who would be a crucial part of the industry in which I would be making my career in. Even though that interview never happened, as I switched to the automotive industry, I had the opportunity to meet him and hear him quite a few times, as he was one of the focal characters in the Indian automotive industry through most of my career.

Ratan Tata would, of course, go on to play a crucial role in expanding the vision and scope of, his group, not only in the automotive industry but also much beyond that. Tata Motors, or Telco as it was then called, was close to his heart because of his passion for cars. The company is where it is largely due to him and he rode through the transformation of the company from a CV manufacturer to a passenger vehicle maker, saw the highs of the success of some products like the Indica, the euphoric joys of launching the Nano, his pet, as well as the acquisition of Jaguar Land Rover. There was also the phase where he was not able to take the decision to shelve the Nano project for the company to turn the page on what turned out to be a rather sorry time in the otherwise triumphant record of the Tata Group. The development of cars at Tata Motors slowed down as he insisted on controlling the final sign-off and wanted things absolutely to his liking to a T, but there is no question that Tata Motors is where it is at because of his vision for the company. Of course, this goes for the larger Tata Group as well.

I last met him at an European airport as I was arriving for a motor show. I was taken aback to see that he was a pale shadow of the man who I had struggled to keep up with on the walk from the banquet hall to the car. Time and age spare no man, but he was still as much of a gentleman as the first time he met me, still as sharp, and still as interested in cars as I had seen him over the years. So the last time we talked, it was about the cars I was looking forward to seeing at that motor show. A large part of the Indian and world automotive industry is no more!