AP PHOTOS: Ratan Tata's legacy is seen throughout India — from meals to work to luxury

NEW DELHI (AP) — It's hard to imagine many Indian households that aren't somehow touched by the $100 billion conglomerate named for the family of Ratan Tata, who died this week at the age of 86.

Tata has been a mythical name in Indian consumers' imaginations for generations. Every day, all across India, people consume the Tata Group's salt and lentils, commute to work on Tata buses passing Tata cars and trucks after applying Tata beauty products in homes built from Tata steel.

In Kashmir, Firdosa Jan makes tea for her family from a packet labeled Tata Tea Gold. Hundreds of miles away in the northeastern Indian state of Nagaland, 25-year-old Teisovinuo Yhome is cooking a dish on an open fire, using Tata salt for seasoning.

Even though it was a business conglomerate, in the popular imagination, Tata was a man to envy and emulate.

At the turn of the 20th century, Ratan Tata’s grandfather, Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata, built the first luxury hotel in India, and many saw it as better than any the British rulers had built in the country. His uncle JRD Tata started the first airline in the country, and it earned praise for its service and punctuality.

Tata was socially conscious before corporate social responsibility became a buzzword for businesses.

The group was the first to introduce early employee benefit programs for its workers in 1896. It built a hospital in Jamshedpur, before starting a steel mill there. In 1892, it established an endowment fund for Indian students seeking to pursue higher studies abroad and in 1909 founded the Indian Institute of Science, now a public research university.

With time its legend has only grown. In 2008, the company grabbed headlines with its “People's Car," the Tata Nano. The car cost about $2,000 at its launch. In the same year, Tata acquired the iconic British brands of Jaguar and Land Rover.

Its product portfolio boasts dozens of brands. The ubiquitous Tata cars, watches, air conditioners, soaps, salt and tea are only a fraction of what the group produces or markets.

An Air India aircraft, owned by the Tata Group, is seen parked against a double rainbow formed over Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, France, Friday, Aug. 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

A man walks past a Tata-owned Range Rover SUV luxury car in Mumbai India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)

Motorists ride past a Tanishq jewelry store, a Tata group venture, in Ahmedabad, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Ajit Solanki)

Archana Patil, 40, her son Darsh Patil, 5, and daughter Bhavya Patil, 13, sit under a Voltas air conditioner, a Tata group product, at home in Ahmedabad, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Ajit Solanki)

A man cleans his Tata Nano car in Hyderabad, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Mahesh Kumar A.)

A woman works in her kitchen with steel utensils made by Tata inside her house in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

An elderly person gets down with a child from a Tata EV passenger bus in Guwahati, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Anupam Nath)

A man gifts a Tata made Titan sports watch to his friend in Guwahati, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Anupam Nath)

A woman carries Tata steel buckets for filling water in a shanty area, in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Tata salt is kept in a wall shelf among other spices in a kitchen in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

A man talks on his mobile phone next to a Tata satellite dish at a slum cluster on the outskirts of Jammu, India, Thursday, Oct.10, 2024.(AP Photo/Channi Anand)

Rita, 52, makes tea using Tata tea bags in New Delhi,India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

Teisovinuo Yhome, 25, adds Tata salt, stored in a separate container, to a dish cooked on an open fire in Kohima, capital of the northeastern Indian state of Nagaland, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Yirmiyan Arthur)

A woman fills a container with Tara lentils in her residence in New Delhi,India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

Prabhat Chandola charges his Tata electric vehicle in New Delhi, India, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

Firdosa Jan, a Kashmiri, pours Tata tea leaf into a container as she prepares tea in her kitchen on the outskirts of Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Dar Yasin)

MIAMI (AP) — Tropical Storm Cristina formed Monday in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Nicaragua, forecasters said.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Cristina had maximum sustained winds of 45 mph (75 kph). It was centered 105 miles (170 kilometers) west-northwest of Managua, Nicaragua, and about 125 miles (200 kilometers) southeast of San Salvador, El Salvador.

A tropical storm warning was in effect from Puerto Sandino to the Guatemala/El Salvador border.

Cristina was forecast to bring rainfall of 4 to 8 inches, with maximum totals of about 12 inches (30 centimeters), across coastal Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala through Thursday.

Cristina was the second tropical storm affecting the Eastern Pacific Ocean. Tropical Storm Boris was spinning off the coast of Mexico on Monday and was expected to make landfall there on Tuesday.

In this satellite image released by NOAA, Tropical Storm Christina is forming on the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Nicaragua, Monday, Jun 8, 2026. (NOAA via AP)