India has about seven lakh villages, of which thousands are bereft of electricity, infrastructure and sound education facilities. Understanding the importance of developing villages to fast-track India's growth story, Tata Power today announced that the company aims to transform Kadachimeth, a tribal village in the Thane district of Maharashtra, into a model village by 2017.

In line with the Independence Day speech of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the need for developing model villages to build a stronger India, the company has pledged to partner with the community of Kadachimeth, and work towards improving their quality of life.

With more than 90% of adivasi (tribal) population, the village is deprived of basic amenities and the standard of living is poor. In the next 3 years, the company plans to engage in developing it into a clean and green village with good roads, good education facilities, medical outreach, and solid infrastructure so that the village becomes a role-model for the neighboring villages to emulate. Tata Power has assigned a team of employees to execute the development work, who will further be supported by the by the time and talent of other employee volunteers so as to harness the energy of the entire Tata Power family through a spirit of 'Shramdaan'.

Commenting on this development, Anil Sardana, CEO and MD, Tata Power stated, ''Our hon'ble Prime Minister gave a call to each MP to adopt a village. At Tata Power, we are pursuing the legacy of our founder, Mr. Jamshetji Tata, who had stated that in a free enterprise, community is not just a stakeholder but in fact the very purpose of its existence. With this philosophy, we will work towards building and developing Kadachimeth as a model village to bring about social upliftment and inclusive development of the community. We will provide full support to our team, and will help them transform Kadachimeth as the most aspired village of the neighborhood from being the most deprived.''

Shares of the company gained Rs 1.9, or 2.19%, to trade at Rs 88.80. The total volume of shares traded was 186,678 at the BSE (12.06 p.m., Monday).