Jamsetji Tata, the founder of the Tata Group, was born in 1839 to Nusserwanji Ratan Tata and Jeevanbai Kavasji Tata.
Apart from Jamsetji, Nusserwanji had four other children — Ratanbai, Maneckbai, Virbaiji, and Jerbai.
Jamsetji married Hirabai Daboo, and they had three children — Sir Dorabji Tata, Dhunbai Tata, and Sir Ratan Tata.
Sir Ratan Tata married Navjbai Sett, and they adopted Naval H Tata.
Naval Tata married Sonoo Commisariat, and they had two sons — Ratan N Tata and Jimmy N Tata.
Naval and Sooni divorced when Ratan was just ten years old. Naval later married Simone Tata, a French-speaking Swiss woman, who was 26 years younger than him.
Ratan Tata had two siblings. Jimmy Tata, his younger brother, has largely stayed out of the public eye, leading a quiet and private life.
Despite owning significant shares in several Tata Group companies—such as Tata Motors, Tata Steel, Tata Sons, and TCS—Jimmy lives in a 2BHK apartment in Colaba, Mumbai.
In 2022, Harsh Goenka, the Chairman of the RPG Group, shared a photo of Jimmy on Twitter, writing, “Did you know of Ratan Tata’s younger brother Jimmy Tata who lives a quiet reticent life in a humble 2 bhk flat in Colaba, Mumbai! Never interested in business, he was a very good squash player and would beat me every time. Low profile like the Tata group!”
Noel Tata, Ratan’s half-brother, was born to Naval and Simone Tata. He is married to Aloo Mistry, and they have three children: Neville, Maya, and Leah Tata.
Maya currently serves on the board of the Tata Medical Centre Trust.
The woman who was the guiding light in young Ratan Tata’s life was his formidable grandmother, Navajbai Tata, also popularly known as Lady Ratan Tata (she was married to the younger son of Jamshetji Tata, founder of the Tata empire.)
When she passed away in August 1965 in Bombay (now Mumbai), Navajbai was the senior-most director of Tata Sons and a well-known philanthropist. The Times of India of August 22, 1965, reported that she was “one of the most illustrious members of the Parsi community’’ and “left her impress not only in the industrial life of Bombay but also in the social welfare sphere’’.
“Chief among them is the Sir Ratan Tata Industrial Institute where more than 300 women and girls are trained in various crafts. She was personally responsible for founding the institute. She was the first woman trustee of the Parsi Panchayat with which she was closely associated from 1939 till 1946 when she resigned,’’ said the obituary in the TOI.
“Lady Tata’s benefactions include a beautiful estate at Navsari, which till recently housed a sports and recreation club, a convalescent home for poor invalid women at Matheran and another at Ootacamund. The major part of the Tata art collection at the Prince of Wales Museum in Bombay and the donation of Rs 12 lakhs by the Sir Ratan Tata Trust to the National Metallurgical Research Institute at Jamshedpur owed a great deal to her.’’
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