Tata Group: Tata Group is today a business group that manufactures everything from salt to software. Tata Group has created many histories during its journey. Today, the companies of the group have established their business all over the world. But, this group started with a big failure. Jamshedji Tata, who is considered the founder of Tata Group, had to close his first company. The name of this company was Tata Shipping Line.
This was revealed by a book written on Jamshedji Tata
This interesting information has come to light in the book (Jamsetji Tata – Powerful Learnings For Corporate Success) written on Jamsetji Tata by two old employees of Tata Group R Gopalakrishnan and Harish Bhat. They have written that Jamsetji Tata never backed down from taking tough decisions. He believed in exploring new possibilities instead of running a business at a loss. Closing the Tata Shipping Line was also such a decision. This was the first company started with the name Tata.
Tata Shipping Line started to compete with English P&O
Jamsetji Tata started Tata Shipping Line to compete with English P&O. English P&O was dominant in 1880 and 1890. It also had the support of the then British Indian government. It charged more money from Indian businessmen. At the same time, it gave relief to British and Jewish companies. This was affecting Jamsetji Tata’s textile business. In such a situation, he went to Japan and made an agreement with the largest shipping line there, Nippon Yusen Kaisha.
Rumors were spread against Tata Shipping Line and rates were reduced
After this, they rented a British ship named Annie Barrow for 1050 pounds per month. This became the first ship of Tata Shipping Line. Shortly after this, they also added a ship named Lindisfarne. They hoped that now the textile industry would have to pay a charge of Rs 12 instead of Rs 19 per ton. But, English P&O gave them a big shock and reduced the rate to Rs 1.8 per ton. Along with this, some merchants who did not use Tata’s ship were also lured with free shipping. Rumors were also spread that Lindisfarne was a bad ship.
Indian businessmen also did not support Jamshedji Tata
Due to this, Indian merchants started distancing themselves from Jamshedji Tata. Jamshedji warned them that if Tata Shipping Line closed down, they would have to pay very high rates in future. He incurred a loss of more than 1 lakh rupees due to this shipping line. With this, Tata Shipping Line closed forever in the pages of history. Apart from this, Empress Mills, Swadeshi Mills, Ahmedabad Advance Mills, Tata Steel and Tata Power started by him climbed the ladder of success. But he could not make Tata Line successful.
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