Steel city of Jamshedpur envisioned by a Parsi, planned by an American and named by a British viceroy turned 103 years on Sunday.

A small hamlet known as Sakchi was rechristened as Jamshedpur on this day in 1919, by Lord Chelmsford, the then Viceroy of India, in memory of Tata Steel founder Jamshedpur Nusserwanji Tata.

Information available from Tata Steel archives revealed that Lord Chelmsford had visited the steel city for the first time to express his gratitude to the Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO, now Tata Steel) for the unstinting support offered to Britain during World War I, which was a major factor in tilting the outcome of the war in favour of the British in the Mesopotamian, Palestine and East African campaigns.

The Tata Steel factory in Jamshedpur Bhola Prasad

On the occasion, Lord Chelmsford had said, "I wanted to come here to express my appreciation of the great work which has been done by the Tata company during the past four years of this war. I can hardly imagine what we should have done during these four years of the Tata company had not been able to give us steel for use not only for Mesopotamia but for Egypt, Palestine and East Africa".

Notably, 29,000 tonnes of steel were supplied for the war effort, majorly used for making rails.

A small quantity of shell bar steel was used, which were rolled into round bars for producing cases for shells.

The shells were manufactured in the ordinance factories which were not a part of Tata Steel.

The British ruler had also said, "This place will see a change in its name and will no longer be known as Sakchi, but will be identified with the name of its founder, bearing down through the ages the name of the late Mr Jamsetji Tata. Hereafter, this place will be known by the name of Jamshedpur."

Today, January 2, 2022 Jamshedpur completed 103 years of being renamed as Jamshedpur from Sakchi, stated a company statement.

US engineer Julian Kennedy had planned the city on the basis of the blueprint of J N Tata, a Parsi, and later, in 1940s, Otto Koenigsberger of Germany gave Jamshedpur its parks and gardens.

"It's a red letter day for Jamshedpur. We feel proud. It's a honour for the management, union and workers," said Shailesh Singh, a senior functionary of Tata Workers' Union.