In the early part of the 20th century, my grandfather K.C. Mammen Mappillai entered the tea business by purchasing estates. Times were hard and costs high. To raise capital, he registered the business as a joint stock company. But, hard times scare investors. A visionary, he was not ready to fold without a fight. He travelled countrywide to meet prospective investors.
In Bombay, he met R.D. Tata, who told him that the Tatas, too, were feeling the pinch. “Tata said he was going through an extremely difficult period and that he, too, might have to hit the road to seek help...,” wrote my grandfather in his autobiography, Reminiscences. He had gone to meet Tata because he was a Jamsetji Tata fan. In the autobiography he noted with amazement that Jamsetji had spent Rs 20 lakh “just on a survey of iron ore and coal deposits in India”. That survey became the bedrock of Tata Steel.
How I admire entrepreneurs of those times. They built timeless institutions with little or no access to funds from abroad, no information network, no angel investors and no MBA! There can be no greater testimony to the strength of their vision than how the companies they founded have fared. Their courage and resolve often reflected in their children, too. You just have to look at J.R.D. Tata to see how much R.D. Tata influenced his son. And, as each generation passes, the challenge is to retain the founder’s flavour and fervour.
On February 21, as N. Chandrasekaran takes over as chairman of Tata Sons, I wish him well. After reading this cover story, you will be rooting for him, too. Principal Correspondent Lakshmi Subramanian met him at his hometown and was bowled over by his warmth and grounded ways. It is tough to topple a grounded man.
By all accounts, Chandrasekaran is a man steeped in the Tata ethos. And, that bodes well for the company and its employees. I know that Tata employees look up to their chairman. I have seen this in my maternal uncle, Philip John, who was with Tata Oil Mills in Chennai, Hyderabad and Kochi.
Sometimes I think the Tatas have a secret handbook for hiring practices. Rarely have I met a Tata employee who is not professional, warm and courteous. Recently, I had the pleasure of spending time with former Test cricketer Yajurvindra Singh, who has written a warm and anecdotal piece in this issue, on his TCS days and his bond with Chandrasekaran. In him I saw another man who exudes the Tata ethos.
Around two decades ago, on January 2, I was at the Taj Malabar at lunch to celebrate my father’s birthday. Seated at the next table was a party of three, of whom two were old Tata hands and close friends of mine—Abhijit Majumdar and Hamid Ashraf. I strolled over to say hello, and they introduced me to the third man, the legendary Darbari Seth of Tata Chemicals. Seth had a twinkle in his eye when I told him that it was my father’s birthday. Soon after I joined my father at our table, Seth came over with a bottle of wine.
Together, Seth and K.M. Mathew toasted their collective birthdays. Seth’s was on January 1.
