JAMSHEDJI NUSSERWANJI TATA

Father of Indian Industry”

Born 3 March 1839(1839-03-03)

Navsari, Gujarat, India

Died 19 May 1904 (aged 65)

Bad Nauheim, Germany

Occupation Businessman

Spouse(s) Hirabai Daboo

Parents Nusserwanji and Jeevanbai Tata

Business: Jamsedji worked in his father's firm until the age of 29. In 1868, he started a trading company with a seed capital of Rs. 21,000. In 1869, he acquired a bankrupt oil mill in Chinchpokli, converted it into a cotton mill and renamed the mill to Alexandra Mill. He sold the mill two years later for a healthy profit. Thereafter he set up a cotton mill in Nagpur in 1874. He christened it Empress Mill on 1 January 1877 when Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India.

He devoted himself to bringing to fruition four of his key ideas: setting up an iron and steel company, a world-class learning institution, a one-of-a-kind hotel and a hydro-electric plant. Only one of the ideas became a reality during his lifetime. The Taj Mahal Hotel was inaugurated on the 3rd of December 1903.

However, the foundations laid by him and hard work by his successors ensured that each of the ideas were eventually established and are respectable entities in their respective fields today:

• Tata Steel (formerly TISCO - Tata Iron and Steel Company Limited) is Asia's first and India's largest and became world's fifth largest steel company,after it acquired anglo-dutch Corus group producing 28 million tonnes of steel annually.

• The Indian Institute of Science

• The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research was founded by Dr. Homi Bhabha. Dr. Homi Bhabha approached J.R.D Tata requesting his support towards the establishing of a scientific institution. The institution was founded in 1945
• The Tata Power Company Limited is India’s largest private sector electricity generating company with an installed generation capacity of over 2300 MW.