Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that he was extremely pained by his passing away and termed Ratan Tata a visionary business leader, a compassionate soul and an extraordinary human being.

As Ratan Tata took his last breath at a South Mumbai hospital on Wednesday night, the entire nation is mourning at the loss. Maharashtra Govt has declared a day of mourning in state on Thursday to pay tributes to industrialist Ratan Tata. As a respect, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, said industrialist Ratan Tata will be accorded a state funeral. He was 86, and a recipient of Padma Vibhushan. The last rites will be performed around 3:30pm today.

Flashback of the life of India’s Anmol Ratan Tata

The renowned industrialist and philanthropist, Tata led Tata Group to global success and invested in numerous ventures. He attended Campion School, Mumbai, Cathedral and John Connon School, Mumbai, Bishop Cotton School, Shimla, and Riverdale Country School in New York City. He is an alumnus of Cornell University and Harvard Business School and earned an Honorary Doctor of Business Administration from Ohio State University in 2004.

When JRD Tata stepped down as chairperson of Tata Sons in 1991, he appointed Ratan Tata as his successor. Ratan Tata encountered strong resistance from many company heads who had spent decades in their roles. To address this, he implemented a retirement age and required each company to report directly to the group office. Under his leadership, the overlapping entities within Tata Sons were streamlined and transformed into a cohesive and synergized organization.

During his 21 years of stewardship, revenues grew over 40 times, and profit over 50 times. He got Tata Tea to acquire Tetley, Tata Motors to acquire Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Steel to acquire Corus, turning the organization from a largely India-centric group into a global business. We cannot forget that Tata Nano car is his brainchild. The car was capped at a price that it could be well called India’s aam aadmi car. 

Besides being a true visionary businessman, he was a big supporter of education, medicine, and rural development, Ratan Tata has supported the University of New South Wales Faculty of Engineering to provide improved water for challenged areas. Tata Education and Development Trust endowed a $28 million Tata Scholarship Fund that will allow Cornell University to provide financial aid to undergraduate students from India. Tata Group donated Rs. 950 million to the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay in 2014 and formed Tata Center for Technology and Design (TCTD). It was the largest ever donation received in the history of the institute. 

Tata Trusts also provided a grant of ₹750 million to the Centre for Neuroscience, the Indian Institute of Science, to study mechanisms underlying the cause of Alzheimer's disease and to evolve methods for its early diagnosis and treatment. Tata Group also formed the MIT Tata Center of Technology and Design at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to address the challenges of resource-constrained communities, with an initial focus on India.

A recipient of Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan from the Government of India. To name a few, he received ‘Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy’ from Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Honorary Citizen Award from Government of Singapore, Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic from Government of Italy, has ‘Responsible Capitalism Award’  from ‘For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology’ (FIRST), Legend in Leadership Award from Yale University, Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun from the Government of Japan in 2013 and Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year – Lifetime Achievement in 2021 in his kitty amongst many others. His death marks a significant loss to India's global business and the world of philanthropy. The world will always remember you.