A monument to love – Mumbai's Taj Mahal

Russi M. Lala


A horrific terrorist attack has ravaged one of Mumbai's most-loved symbols and taken the lives of many of its dedicated staff. This heritage hotel was not started as a commercial venture. It was Jamsetji Tata's gift to the city he loved — as the Taj Mahal of Agra was Shah Jahan's memorial to the woman he loved.


MUMBAI'S PRIDE: Before the Gateway of India was built, the Taj Mahal offered the first view of the city of Bombay to ships sailing into the harbour. Even now, with many more tall buildings on the skyline, the hotel engages immediate attention.
The 1880s and 1890s were a time of great construction in Bombay. The Grand Victoria Terminus was built, and after it the Municipal Corporation building, another beautiful structure, followed by the Churchgate headquarters of the B.B. & C.I. Railways (now Western Railways). But there was no hotel worthy of the growing city.

Being an ardent fan of Mark Twain, Jamsetji Tata may have read of the writer's fate in the so-called 'best' Watson's Hotel: Mark Twain and his family were roused every morning at dawn by doors slamming, servants shouting, and "fiendish bursts of laughter, explosions of dynamite." The Irish chef at the hotel was apparently more conversant with the French language that with French cooking, "serving up Irish stew on 14 occasions under 14 different French names." Sir Stanley Reed, Editor of The Times of India, said Jamsetji had an intense pride and affection for the city of his birth, and when a friend protested against the intense discomforts of hotel life in Bombay, he growled: "I will build one."

One day without consulting anybody, not even his sons or partners, he announced his plan to build a grand hotel. It was his personal contribution and money he was putting in — not that of Tata & Sons. Along the present Yacht Club at Apollo Bunder was a little bay where yachts used to scull. The British were reclaiming the land and he bought a substantial site of two-and-a-half acres on November 1, 1898 on a 99-year lease. There was no formal laying of a foundation stone but a traditional coconut was broken and a Parsi diva (oil lamp) was lit, perhaps by the well or spring between the present swimming pool and the lifts. This ceremony took place in 1900.

Many an interesting story is invented round the Taj being designed by an Italian/French architect who, after his exertions, went home and returned to find the building was put the wrong way around — what should have been in the rear was in front and vise versa. Heartbroken he went to the top floor of the Taj and flung himself out of the window. Dramatic! Touching! But not true. As anyone who stayed at the then-non-air-conditioned Taj in the summer would attest, the late afternoon breezes that blow across Colaba do not spring up from the harbour but sweep in from across Back Bay. The U-shaped wings of the hotel were positioned to trap this breeze and extract the most benefit.

Indeed, the necessity to draw whatever relief there might be from the torrid heat of western India was certainly the inspiration behind the hotel's two most original features. At the time, the clientele Jamsetji expected was from abroad and his endeavour was to make the hotel as cool as possible. Thus it had high ceilings and wide corridors, which would be conducive to air circulation. Furthermore, the Wellington Mews — another property Jamsetji bought — behind the hotel site was where the horses and carriages were housed and these could roll in directly from the west side.

One convincing explanation comes from the daughter of a Goan customs officer, Francis Xavier D'Mello, who was stationed in the customs shed at Apollo Bunder and witnessed the Taj rising stone by stone: "Jamsetji Tata came regularly to watch his great hotel being built. The customs shed provided the only shelter from the blazing sun, so Mr. Tata used to come there and have long chats with my father. Once my father asked him why he had put the entrance to the Taj at the back, and Jamsetji told him that he wanted the majority of his hotel guests to have rooms overlooking the sea. Jamsetji surely had some hand in his broad instructions to the architect."

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