Ratan Naval Tata’s trusted advisor and youngest general manager Shantanu Naidu mourned the loss of the veteran business mogul and national icon. Shantanu bids farewell to Ratan Tata, the legendary industrialist, by comparing his boss to a ‘lighthouse’.

Shantanu, 30, shared a heartfelt post on social media about his “dear lighthouse” and expressed the deep void left by the industrialist’s demise. “I will spend the rest of my life filling the void that this friendship has left in me.” Grief is the price of love. Goodbye, my dear lighthouse,” his post read.

Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of Tata Sons and philanthropist, died on October 9 at the age of 86. He was admitted to Breach Candy Hospital in Mumbai in a critical condition where he breathed his last. Several politicians and industry leaders have expressed their shock and grief over the death of Ratan Tata.

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How Shantanu Naidu and Ratan Tata met

Both Shantanu Naidu and Ratan Tata had great love and care for dogs. Ratan Tata was nicknamed “Millennial Dumbledore”, a title bestowed on him by his assistant Shantanu Naidu, who worked closely with the industrialist from 2018 onwards.

The story behind this title dates back to 2014 when Naidu, then a design engineer at Tata Group, went on a mission to protect stray dogs after witnessing a tragic accident involving a stray dog. Tormented by the sight of a stray dog’s death, Shantanu created a reflective collar to help drivers notice the strays more quickly. As he was facing financial problems, his father advised him to write to Ratan Tata, whose love for dogs knows no bounds. Hesitant but hopeful, Naidu sent a handwritten letter and two months later was surprised to receive a reply from Tata inviting him to Mumbai. Ratan Tata responded with much more than an acknowledgment. Naidu received an investment from Tata and a permanent bond for this venture. Naidu soon went to the US for his masters and upon his return was placed in the office of RNT, the private office of the industrialist who served his term as chairman of Tata Sons.

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Outside his day job of managing operations for Tata, Naidu continued to create socially relevant platforms and services, and his indulgent boss often supported these ideas, most notably Goodfellows, a subscription-based companion service for seniors that launched in 2022.

Despite having health issues, Ratan Tata made sure to attend the launch event of the startup in which he had invested an undisclosed sum. The images of this event are fresh in everyone’s memory, as are the images of Naidu celebrating his boss’s birthday a few months earlier.

(With agency input)