How Jamsetji Tata started a culture of philanthropy
The philosophy of giving back to society is the legacy of Jamsetji Tata, the Founder of the Tata group and an entrepreneur with a heart of gold
The genesis of the Tata Trusts can be traced back to the extraordinarily humane thinking of one man — Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata, pioneer, patriot and philanthropist.
Born into a family of Parsi Zoroastrian priests, Jamsetji’s entrepreneurial spirit led him to start a trading firm and, subsequently, a textile business. His vision led him to conceptualise pioneering industrial ventures in power and steel in colonial India.
JNT’s inherent generosity of heart and his love for India led him to start, back in 1892, India’s first scholarship for higher studies. The JN Tata Endowment was the first of the Tata Trusts, marking the beginning of the 126-year journey of nation-building and community welfare.
Support for science
Jamsetji pledged 
3 million — half his personal fortune — to setting up the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru. The institute has been instrumental in nurturing India’s atomic energy and space programmes and several of India’s foremost scientists have been closely associated with it, including Nobel laureate CV Raman, Homi J Bhabha, Vikram S Sarabhai and the latest Bharat Ratna awardee, CNR Rao.
Jamsetji’s love for country and humanity was passed on to his sons Dorabji and Ratanji. The younger of them, Ratanji — an altruist by nature and deeply concerned with sparking social change — supported several institutions and deserving causes in his lifetime (including Mahatma Gandhi’s struggle against apartheid in South Africa).
Following Ratanji’s death, the bulk of his wealth went to the Sir Ratan Tata Trust, established with a corpus of 8 million in 1918, making it one of India’s oldest charitable organisations.
Elder son Dorabji was an equally committed philanthropist. He established the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust in 1932 to catalyse development and advance learning and research. Dorabji’s entire fortune — with an estimated value of 10 million — was pledged to the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust. It included substantial shareholdings in Tata Sons, Indian Hotels and other Tata companies; landed properties; and 21 pieces of his wife’s jewellery and the famous ‘jubilee diamond’.
Philanthropy multiplied
Dorabji also set up the Lady Tata Memorial Trust in his wife’s memory, which he endowed with a corpus for research in leukaemia. The Lady Meherbai D Tata Education Trust was formed to train women in hygiene, health and social welfare. The Navajbai Ratan Tata Trust was formed in 1974 in memory of Sir Ratan Tata’s wife Navajbai. In similar vein, JRD Tata established trusts in his and his wife Thelma’s name.
Today there are many Tata trusts that together operate under the umbrella of the Tata Trusts. Over the past 12 decades, the Tata Trusts have played a sterling role in supporting social development and in building some of India’s most exceptional institutes, among them the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Tata Memorial Centre, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the National Centre for Performing Arts.
The one common tenet that has supported the work of the Trusts has been the commitment to improving the quality of life of India and its people, especially those on the margins.
Two-thirds of the shareholding of Tata Sons, the promoter and holding company of the Tata group, is held by the Trusts, ensuring that wealth creation remains inclusive and connects back to the community. The Tata Trusts are all about giving back to society. That was Jamsetji’s passion and his legacy.
