Tata Steel managing director B. Muthuraman and R.M. Lala cut a cake to mark the 100 years of Tata Steel. Pix: Srinivas

Jamshedpur, Aug. 26: Tata Steel today began its centenary celebration here by announcing a mega social initiative programme

The Rs 100-crore project, to run for five years, would be dedicated to the economically weaker section of the society in and around the steel city and the states where Tata Steel operates.

B. Muthuraman, the managing director of Tata Steel, announced the project today at Tata Steel Archives in Jamshedpur. “We have always believe in giving back to the society,” he said. Tata Steel would take on land and water management initiatives in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Orissa to uplift the livelihood of 40,000 tribal households. The company aspires to create these blocks into models of excellence that may be replicated both by the government and corporate entities active in the area of community development.

The project would create assured irrigation facilities for the tribals, set up water user co-operatives, develop wasteland, promote horticulture and agro-forestry.

The project would also encourage to improve agricultural improvement through technological upgrade.

Tata Steel has signed a memorandum of understanding with The Ratan Tata Trust for providing technical support for the project.

It may be recalled at the Tata Tea annual general meeting held earlier this month in Calcutta, Ratan Tata had suggested that those supporting the cause for farmers should do something for them and the propaganda should not be politically motivated.

Tata Steel would depute Tata Steel Rural Development Society (TSRDS) as the nodal agency for implementing the project. TSRDS’s operational area has grown from 32 villages to more than 700 villages. Muthuraman said that to commemorate the centenary year, a second project was on the anvil.

The company planned to set up all-day schools for SC/ST children in backward districts of Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Orissa, with a capacity of 1,000 children in each of them.