The opposite Tata: Noel now at coronary heart of succession battle | Lengthy Reads Information

A February 24 board assembly at Bombay Home, the headquarters of the Tata Group, introduced the variations between Noel Tata and Tata Sons Chairman N Chandrasekaran to the fore. (Categorical Picture by Ganesh Shirsekar)

He didn’t need the extension of his time period to undergo with out the approval of Noel Tata, chairman of Tata Trusts, the family-run philanthropic arm that owns roughly two-thirds of Tata Sons.

Household Tree

It was some extent, Tata watchers say, when Noel, for lengthy the ‘different Tata’ within the room, got here into his personal. It could have been laborious for anybody to step into the legendary Ratan Tata’s sneakers, probably even more durable to step out of them. That Noel — Ratan Tata’s half-brother, 20 years his junior — may have that day successfully vetoed Chandrasekaran, the person Ratan Tata had appointed to the submit as an alternative of his half-brother, was outstanding for a enterprise home that has lengthy prided itself on reaching key selections by consensus.

Noel Tata is the chairman of Tata Trusts, the family-run philanthropic arm that owns roughly two-thirds of Tata Sons.

On August 12, Chandrasekaran introduced his resolution to exit as Tata Sons chairman on the finish of his time period in February 2027, bringing to a detailed probably the most dramatic boardroom battles in latest instances. With Noel prone to be on the five-member choice committee that can select Chandrasekaran’s successor, he may have a decisive say in who comes subsequent.

“In an organization, the proprietor has each proper to rent and fireplace key individuals. Tata Trusts and group corporations personal majority stakes in Tata Sons. He (Noel) has each proper to make suggestions for the submit as Tata Trusts’ chairman, clearly with the backing of different trustees,” a senior Tata Group official instructed The Indian Categorical.

(From left) Naval Tata with sons Noel and Ratan. (Supply: Horizons, Tata Trusts)

Ratan and Noel

From the Nineties till his loss of life in 2024, Ratan Tata had been the general public face of the Tata Group, the person on the coronary heart of an empire spanning metal, vehicles, aviation, software program, energy, inns, client companies and far else. Whereas he stepped down as chairman of Tata Sons in December 2012, he continued to steer Tata Trusts and have a decisive affect over the group’s governance, till his loss of life in October 2024.

It was then that Noel emerged because the household’s important consultant. Whereas Ratan Tata’s ailing youthful brother Jimmy Tata paid public homage to his departed sibling at Mumbai’s Nationwide Centre for the Performing Arts on October 10, it was Noel who obtained VIP company all through the mourning interval.

After Ratan Tata’s loss of life on October 9, 2024, Noel obtained VIP company all through the mourning interval.

In his homage, Noel Tata stated, “There is no such thing as a greatness the place there isn’t any simplicity, goodness and reality, Leo Tolstoy stated. Measure Ratan Tata by these traits, and there might be no doubting what he dropped at the world he lived in and what we have now misplaced along with his passing.”

For the longest time, nonetheless, the half-brothers had been distant, with their upbringing beneath totally different circumstances. After Ratan Tata’s father Naval Hormusji Tata separated from their mom Soonoo Commissariat, Ratan and Jimmy Tata had been largely introduced up by their grandmother Navajbai Tata.

Ratan Tata’s mom Soonoo Commisariat.

Naval went on to marry Swiss-born Simone Dunoyer, and by the point Noel was born to the couple in 1957, Ratan Tata was 20 years previous.

In her 2021 e-book The Tatas, Freddie Mercury & Different Bawas, veteran journalist and The Indian Categorical’s Contributing Editor Coomi Kapoor writes that when Ratan Tata returned to India after graduating from Cornell College and staying again within the US for seven years, it was to a really totally different house. “…it’s potential that Ratan might have felt ignored within the household house. His father had a brand new household, which included his half-brother — christened Noel, since he was born on Christmas Day. Noel was twenty years youthful, and maybe Ratan resented the newcomer’s presence. The connection between Ratan and his stepmother is believed to be fairly distant.”

Company construction of Tata Group

Noel, Kapoor writes, was then “the indulged child boy, twenty years youthful than his half-brother. Ratan was usually not current at Noel’s mom Simone’s Christmas and New 12 months bashes, despite the fact that he lived subsequent door”.

The Noel household lives in Windermere constructing in downtown Mumbai’s Cuffe Parade, not very removed from the sea-facing Bakhtawar, additionally referred to as Cabins and Halekai bungalow, Ratan Tata’s house in Colaba.

Naval Tata.

Noel, now 69, is married to Aloo Mistry, the sister of former Tata Sons chairman Cyrus Mistry. In 2003, Noel, together with your entire Mistry household, acquired Irish citizenship after his father-in-law Pallonji Mistry’s marriage to Dublin-based Patsy Perin.

Noel’s mom Simone, who was the mind behind Lakme, the Tata group’s standard beauty model, died in December 2025. Trent, the group’s retail arm that Noel rotated and is arguably his largest achievement but, was created in 1998 from the proceeds of sale of Lakme.

Noel Tata’s mom Simone Dunoyer.

“I solely know Noel Tata as an academically well-qualified, achieved, low-profile individual. Together with his distinguished mom, he constructed a Rs 180,000-crore retail enterprise in India,” says R Gopalakrishnan, former Director of Tata Sons.

Noel took over as Managing Director of Trent in 1999 after a Bachelor’s from Sussex College (UK) and an Worldwide Govt Programme at France’s INSEAD. Below Noel, Trent expanded dramatically throughout codecs, ultimately turning into the corporate behind family names corresponding to Westside and Zudio. From one retailer in 1998, Westside grew to greater than 1,200 shops throughout codecs throughout his tenure.

In June this yr, Noel introduced on the Trent Annual Normal Assembly that he was stepping down as chairman in keeping with the Tata Group’s governance pointers, beneath which non-executive administrators retire at 70.

Regardless of Noel’s profitable stint at Trent, Ratan Tata was, by all accounts, unwilling to advertise his half brother. As late as 2019, Noel was not even a trustee on any of the most important Tata trusts.

Moreover, he was missed for the submit of chairman of Tata Sons not less than twice. In 2012, when Ratan Tata determined to retire as Chairman of Tata Sons, most eyes turned in the direction of the low-profile, reticent Noel. However the mantle finally went to Cyrus Mistry. Then, in 2016, when Mistry was dramatically ousted from the chairmanship, hypothesis once more swirled round Noel. However then, too, he was missed, this time in favour of Chandrasekaran, then the MD and CEO of Tata Consultancy Services, the group’s flagship know-how firm.

The Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai opened its doorways on 16 December 1903. (Categorical images by Akash Patil)

In his e-book, Ratan Tata: A Life, creator and former bureaucrat Thomas Mathew quotes Ratan Tata as saying, “Maybe, if Noel had the expertise of dealing with tough assignments, he may have established his credentials extra forcefully.”

Aside from that uncommon comment, each Ratan and Noel Tata spoke little or no about one another in public. However folks near Noel say that Ratan was keen on his half-brother’s kids Leah, Maya and Neville. Neville is already a trustee in Tata Trusts and is concerned within the retail enterprise. Leah works with Indian Lodges and Maya with Tata Digital and Trent.

In February 2019, Noel was lastly inducted as a trustee of the Sir Ratan Tata Belief. He was lastly inducted as a trustee of the Sir Dorab Tata Belief in February 2022. (Categorical photograph by A.Srinivas)

In February 2019, Noel was lastly inducted as a trustee of the Sir Ratan Tata Belief, one of many two core, allied trusts that anchor the Tata Trusts community. Kapoor writes, “It was solely when Ratan’s long-time monetary advisor, Noshir Soonawala, stepped down, on the age of eighty-four, and reportedly referred to as on Ratan to induct Noel that Ratan’s half-brother was appointed in his place.”

The bond between the 2 half-siblings, Coomi Kapoor writes, turned stronger after 2016, round which period, Noel says in an interview, they met commonly. In February 2022, he was lastly inducted as a trustee of the Sir Dorab Tata Belief, too.

Sir Dorab Tata

Noel comes into his personal

Individuals who know him say Noel, often seen in button-down shirts in blue or white, is self-effacing and reserved. “Once I met him at a easy Tata visitor home in Mumbai once I was concerned in writing the e-book, I realised he has superb imaginative and prescient about numerous issues,” Mathew says.

Others, nonetheless, see a special facet. “As a enterprise chief, he’s untested to date,” says a high supply who’s a part of the Tata ecosystem. “He was not a part of the core enterprise of producing within the group. He was the chairman of the loss-making Tata Worldwide.”

A high supply within the Tata Group says, “Whereas Noel lacks the stature and standing of Ratan Tata within the Indian industrial panorama, he has proved his mettle by efficiently working corporations like Trent and Tata Funding Company… and he was on the boards of main Tata corporations like Tata Steel. His function can be that of a information, guard and policy-maker for the group. He can at all times step in when Tata Sons or group corporations make flawed selections.”

But, all of them level to the February 2026 assembly, when he challenged Chandrasekaran on the latter’s reappointment and the route of the group, as proof of a person more and more prepared to make his views heard and set up his authority — a lot as Ratan Tata had performed a long time earlier.

Taj Lodges is the posh resort chain owned by the Tata Group. (Categorical images by Akash Patil)

In 1991, when Ratan Tata took over as chairman of Tata Sons from Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy (JRD) Tata, who stepped down after main the conglomerate for over 50 years, he eased out a number of the most outstanding faces — from Russi Mody of Tata Metal to Darbari Seth of Tata Chemical substances and Ajit Kerkar of Indian Lodges — and changed them along with his males.

In Noel’s case, it began with Mehli Mistry, his spouse’s cousin and Ratan Tata’s shut buddy. Final yr, Mehli was not renominated to the Tata Trusts. One other Tata Trusts member, former Citi India CEO Pramit Jhaveri, noticed the writing on the wall and didn’t go for reappointment. Chandrasekaran, too, had earlier postponed the choice on his extension.

The Tata Group formally took over Air India on January 27, 2022. (Categorical Picture by Ganesh Shirsekar)

There had, for a while, been a way inside the group that Noel and Chandrasekaran had differing views on the route of Tata Sons. A few of Noel’s considerations had been about the way in which the group was evolving beneath Chandrasekaran — together with how far it ought to transfer into newer companies, how these companies had been being managed and the way the Tata Group’s long-established tradition must be preserved. The query of whether or not Tata Sons ought to stay personal had develop into one other level of distinction, as had the losses being incurred by a few of its newer and unlisted companies.

The best way forward for Noel, Tatas

When the five-member choice committee, which can embody Noel Tata, meets to determine on the brand new chairman of Tata Sons, there can be inquiries to confront. Will the brand new chairman be a Tata insider, somebody promoted from the various Tata corporations? A member of the family? A member of the Parsi neighborhood? Or will the Tatas look past as they scout for expertise?

Sir Ratan Tata

These near Noel say that his selection will replicate a few of his considerations associated to the Group.

Whereas the market capitalisation of the Tata Group’s listed corporations has greater than tripled over the previous 9 years, rising to round Rs 27 lakh crore, it has been accompanied by mounting losses at a number of the group’s main unlisted companies, and these corporations have to be returned to profitability.

The losses of eight unlisted Tata corporations stood at Rs 33,538 crore in FY26. Air India accounted for the most important share of those losses, with its annual loss doubling to Rs 22,238 crore. Tata Digital, one other key unlisted enterprise that homes the group’s digital ambitions, reported a lack of Rs 4,974 crore throughout the yr.

Air India accounted for the most important share of those losses, with its annual loss doubling to Rs 22,238 crore. Categorical Picture by Ganesh Shirsekar)

Because the group seems for a brand new route and funding plan within the wake of adjusting technological developments, Noel’s each transfer, particularly the choice of the brand new chairman of Tata Sons, can be keenly watched and scrutinised.