#history
Sooni Tata.
Sooni Tata was the wife of Ratanji Dadhabhoy Tata, and the mother of JRD Tata, the longest serving Chairman of the Tata Empire.
She was a French lady.
Ratanji was married to earlier married to a Parsi lady at a young age. However, she died childless, not long after the marriage.
Sir Ratan met Sussanne in Paris and fell in love with the beautiful girl.
R.D. Tata was in his forties when he remarried Suzanne Brière, in 1902. Sussanne fully adapted the Parsi customs and came to be known as Soony Tata. She was the first woman in India to drive a car.
The marriage of a Parsi to a French woman was considered revolutionary at the time and was not welcomed by many in the Parsi community.
The couple had five children Rodabeth, Jehangir, Jimmy, Sylla and Dorab.
RD Tata had a brother Sir Dorab Tata who was married to Lady Meherbai Tata. The couple had no children.
JRD Tata’s brother Jimmy died in an accident and JRD Tata became the sole inheritor of the Tata Empire. However the two brothers and their wives had bequeathed majority of their vast fortune to trusts established by them.
(photo 1.taken in 1899).
