'When my mother remarried…' Ratan Tata opens up about his parents' separation, childhood and first love
In a 2020 interview with Humans of Bombay, Tata shared a personal story about his childhood, the aftermath of his parents' divorce, and how he almost got married.
Ratan Tata, former chairman of the Tata Group, passed away at the age of 86 on October 9 at a hospital in Mumbai. Tata, who led a diverse salt-to-software conglomerate for more than two decades, breathed his last last week. The Padma Vibhushan awardee was in the intensive care unit of the hospital for 2 days.
After completing his BS in Architecture from Cornell University, Ithaca, New York in 1962, Tata joined the family business. A decade later, he became the chairman of Tata Industries. In 1991, he succeeded his uncle, JRD Tata, as the Chairman of the Tata Group and led the company after his uncle's half-century tenure.
Ratan Tata on his parents' divorce
“I had a happy childhood, but as my brother and I grew up, we faced a lot of raging and personal turmoil due to our parents' divorce, which was not as common in those days as it is today,” said Ratan Tata. said
“But my grandmother raised us in every way. Soon after my mother remarried, the kids at school started saying all kinds of things about us – constantly and aggressively. But our grandmother taught us to maintain honor at all costs, a value that has stayed with me to this day.”
Ratan Tata fell in love
In a single interview with People of Bombay Ratan Tata said that after graduating in architecture, he was working in an architecture firm in Los Angeles and it was here that he fell in love and almost got married.
“After college, I got a job at an architecture firm in LA, where I worked for two years. It was a good time, the weather was beautiful, I had my own car and I loved my job. It was in LA that I fell in love and almost got married. But at the same time I had decided to withdraw at least temporarily due to being away from my grandmother, who was not in good health for 7 years,” he added in an interview. People of Bombay.
“So I came back to meet her and thought the person I wanted to marry would come with me to India, but her parents were not okay with her going ahead with the Indo-China war of 1962 and the relationship broke off. Different,” he added.
