From Namakkal village to top job at Tata
NAMAKKAL:A QUIET and obedient boy from a village in Namakkal district has been chosen to lead one of India’s oldest multinational conglomerates — this summarises Natarajan Chandrasekaran’s life from a government school to Coimbatore Institute of Technology, from REC to TCS and now from the role of CEO of TCS to the chairman of Tata Sons. Chandrasekaran comes from an illustrious family in Mohanur, 20 km from Namakkal. He is the third son of S Natarajan Iyer, an advocate in the Madras High Court who left the practice to return to farming.
“He is a very simple man. Even when he was studying at the Mohanur Government School, he never allowed his family’s wealth come in the way of his interaction with others,” reminisces his cousin G Ajeethan.
When Chandrasekaran called a few days back, Ajeethan had asked about him being chosen for the post of chairman. “He did not say anything. That is Chandrasekaran— simple and dedicated,” says Ajeethan.
K S Natarajan (72), a retired teacher who taught Chandrasekaran, remembers him as a brilliant student. “His favourite subject was science,” said Natarajan. A friend recalled Chandrasekaran’s passion for cricket. “While in Standard X, he was the captain of our cricket team. I was the vice-captain,” said Narendran, 51, two years junior to Chandrasekaran. “He was an all-rounder, but loved to bowl as a leg spinner,” Narendran said. The new chairman of Tata Sons is also a man with a good sense of humour, according to Narendran.
Ajeethan said Chandrasekaran was in the first batch that passed Plus Two from Mohanur School. After completing his studies there, he did BSc (Applied Science) at the Coimbatore Institute of Technology. He then joined the Regional Engineering College in Tiruchy, where he was in the first MCA batch. In 1983, Chandrasekaran joined TCS as a systems analyst, beginning the journey that culminated with the chairmanship of the Tata group. “I am proud of my son’s achievement. He had a keen interest in studies. So I educated him well. He had interest in entrepreneurship,” said Chandrasekaran’s father Natarajan Iyer.