Ratan Tata: An Environmentalist's Homage

Our first interaction with the late Ratan Tata was not pleasant. Delhi was choking with pollution, and our campaign on the right to clean air had been launched. Diesel was a fuel that was being indicted for emissions of tiny particulate matter PM2.5. This all was new in the mid-1990s, as science was discovering how fuel and vehicle quality, when improved, would lead to an unexpected outcome of smaller particulates, which could go deep into our lungs. So, my late colleague Anil Agarwal and I wrote about the dangers of diesel. And we promptly got a defamation notice of some consequent sum of money from Tata Motors. That was when Ratan Tata had just launched his car enterprise. It was riding on the change of fuel - diesel, which would give his company an edge over the petrol variants of Maruti Suzuki and others. We were not the kind to back down. Nor was he. It was a messy battle in the highest court of the country.

- SUNITA NARAIN

Slowly, what went on was anger in this contest. As the matter proceeded, I realised that Ratan Tata was driven to the case genuinely believing that we were doing this on behalf of his competitors - petrol car guys. But once it was established that our campaign was based on the emerging science of PM2.5, and the health impact of diesel as an automotive fuel - the mood changed. This is not to say that Tata Motors backed down from its diesel car ambition. And it is not as if we gave up our fight against diesel vehicles. But it settled into what you can say were good old-fashioned democratic traditions of acceptance of contrary views. In fact, when Ratan Tata launched his pet project, the Nano cars, at the Delhi automobile exhibition, he called out my name, saying that he hoped this affordable vehicle would meet my approval. Amazing and humbling.