As curious tales go, Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, more popularly called Taj Mumbai, the iconic institution of Indian entrepreneurship, hospitality and grand architecture, has many doing the rounds. This one, of course, is the most popular: Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata decided to build Taj Mumbai, because he was denied admission to Watson’s Hotel, Pyrke’s Apollo Hotel and Yacht Club, because he was not a European. Angered by it, JN Tata vowed to build a hotel far grander than any.

But this one takes the cake: Apparently, a Frenchman designed the Taj (sometimes, there’s variation and the French becomes Italian). Some years later, the said architect visited the grand hotel, designed according to his specifications but built back to front. The grand entrance did not face the sea. He was so shattered that he threw himself off the newly built fifth floor and died instantaneously.

These stories floating by the Arabian Sea are partly the reason why Mumbai-based historian and researcher Sharada Dwivedi and British historian Charles Allen decided to go deep into history — and into several archives — and separate facts from fiction. The result, The Taj At Apollo Bunder, is perhaps the first comprehensive history of the “hotel by the bay”, revealing not just a grand vision of a great man but also about a city in the making. “An act of discrimination may well have taken place. But there is no evidence to prove such a story. I have not come across anything in my research. Jamsetji Tata never spoke of any such humiliation,” says Dwivedi, sitting at the poolside of the Taj Mumbai. “It seems far too petty a reason to fire a man of the calibre of JN Tata, who in the past had not hesitated to cross swords with governments and powerful commercial combines,” she adds between sipping her hot masala chai.

Dwivedi offers a far more plausible reason, quoting Lovat Fraser, the then editor of The Times of India, and a close friend of the Tatas besides being one of the Indian Hotels Company’s early directors: “I once wrote an article in which I said that the man who built a hotel worthy of such a city would do more for Bombay than the donor of many museums. He (JN Tata) came to me and told me that the idea had long been simmering in his mind, and that he had made much study of the subject. He had not the slightest desire to own a hotel, however; his sole wish was to attract people to India, and incidentally to improve Bombay.”

Dwivedi rubbished the legend about French architect committing suicide. “The original architects of the Taj were Sitaram Khanderao Vaidya, Ashok Kumar and DN Mirza, and the project was completed by an English engineer, WA Chambers. And it was not built back to front by mistake. The architects had always intended to construct this way, so that the entrance faced the Colaba back lanes giving horse drawn carriages a grand entry,” explains Dwivedi.

The book was originally planned for the hotel’s 75th anniversary, and then pushed back for its centenary in 2003. But the authors managed to complete and release it on the 108th anniversary of the Taj, after three decades of meticulous research. The book is published by Pictor Publishing and is priced at Rs 5,495. The proceeds of the sale will be donated to the Taj Public Service Welfare Trust.

“It took us so long as we had to find evidences to prove that some stories were just myths. We went through libraries and government archives, old newspapers and magazines. We conducted 150 interviews to record the oral history,” says Dwivedi. According to her, another reason why JN Tata built this hotel is because he so loved this city and wanted tourists to come back after it was hit by bubonic plague that claimed several lives for almost four years from 1896.

When JN Tata decided to build the hotel on a 10,000 square yard land he had taken on a 99-year lease from the Bombay Port Trust in 1893, he was rebuked by his sisters saying, “why do you even think of opening a ‘bhatyarkhana’ (eating house)?” Interestingly, when JRD Tata joined the board, he wanted to sell it. At many times the hotel went into serious financial difficulties.

In the foreword to the book, Ratan Tata, the current chairman of the Tata Group, also make a note about the initial struggle. “Jamsetji Tata, overreached himself in creating the ‘finest address east of the Suez’ for the wealthy international traveller but, in reality, Taj struggled for a steady clientele in the initial decades.”

The Taj has a history of hosting maharajas and freedom fighters. This is also the first place in Mumbai — and in India — to introduce electricity and phones. It also popularised cabaret, jazz, ballroom and tearoom dancing and later, opened the first discotheque. The authors have also dug out some not-so-good facts about the iconic hotel. In 1966, the building was so run-down that the President of Hilton Hotels said the old Taj would remain standing “only as long as the termites keep holding hands.”