Guwahati, Jul 13 (PTI) The country's largest power producer NTPC on Wednesday said it has rolled out a four-week long empowerment programme for underprivileged girls in Assam to train 40 minors in different skills.

The programme -- Girl Empowerment Mission (GEM) -- is being conducted by the power major across the country since 2018 and was launched in Assam for the first time.

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Rolling out the initiative on Tuesday, NTPC Executive Director (Bongaigaon Plant) Subrata Mandal said the company is conducting the programme for the first time in Assam to uplift the underprivileged girls.

"We have shortlisted 40 girls of age group 10-12 years. The exercise has come a long way right from the baseline survey, medical examination, registration process and finally at this campus," he said in a statement.

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Mandal said that NTPC started GEM in 2018 and contributed to the empowerment of 4,500 underprivileged girls in the vicinity of its project locations across the nation.

He also thanked the Bodoland Territorial Council government, Kokrajhar district administration and the Department of Education in supporting NTPC Bongaigaon since the conceptualisation of the programme.

The NTPC GEM programme will empower girls by making them aware of basic education, health and self-defence. With this initiative, NTPC aims to help these girls break the glass ceiling and dispel the misconception about female foeticide in rural areas.

In the coming four weeks, the 40 girls will be provided training on different subjects, life skills and will be engaged in extracurricular activities such as outdoor games, puppetry and yoga at NTPC's plant location in Salakati, Kokrajhar.

"The CSR initiative will ensure that the girl child grows into a well-rounded adult with ample curiosity and quality communication and social skills," Mandal said.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)