~ In Buxar, the team was joined by 500 volunteers, collected 3.5 tonnes of waste and engaged 3,800+ students ~

Tata Steel Adventure Foundation (TSAF) Chief Ms. Bachendari Pal-led ‘Mission Gange’ team today arrived in Patna, the final stopover of the month-long rafting expedition aimed to raise awareness about the waste management and Ganga cleanliness.

The 40-member team reached Patna after a day (October 27) cleanliness drive in Buxar, where they collected 3.5 tonnes of waste from the Ganga ghats. Buxar was the seventh stopover for team ‘Mission Gange’, after covering Haridwar, Bijnor, Farrukhabad, Kanpur, Prayagraj and Varanasi since its commencement on October 5, 2018.

In Buxar, the team was joined by 500 volunteers of Ganga Task Force and Ganga Vichar Manch. They also engaged with more than 3,800 students from various schools and interacted with 1,000 community people. ‘Mission Gange’ team organised a Prabhat Pheri with 250 participants to spread cleanliness message. A Ganga aarti was also held at the Ramrekha ghat.

‘Mission Gange’ team will be in Patna from October 28 to October 30. They will be conducting cleanliness drives at various ghats and visit various schools in the city. The team will also participate in a Swachta rally being organised at Gandhi Maidan.

‘Mission Gange’ is a joint initiative of Tata Steel Adventure Foundation (TSAF) and National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) to raise awareness about waste management and Ganga cleanliness through a month-long rafting expedition. The expedition, covering 1,500 kms of the Ganga and encompassing eight major towns including Haridwar, Bijnor, Farrukhabad, Kanpur, Prayagraj, Varanasi, and Buxar, will conclude in Patna on October 30, 2018. The 40-member team from Tata Steel is led by Ms Bachendri Pal, the first Indian woman to scale Mount Everest and Chief of TSAF.

TSAF has brought together a diverse and industrious team of 40 individuals (20 women and 20 men) including eight mountaineers (Bachendri Pal, Premlata Agarwal, Hemant Gupta, R S Pal, Chetna Sahoo, Binita Soren, Poonam Rana, Swarnlata Dalai) who have summited Mt. Everest, and 23 Tata Steel employees. Besides, professionals from backgrounds as diverse as engineering, environmentalists, science etc. are part of the expedition team that is prepared to meet all the challenges that they may encounter during the expedition. The team, during its stay in various towns along the course, will carry out cleanliness drives at Ghats and surrounding areas, visit schools and institutions to create awareness on waste management, pollution in Ganga and climate change.

About Tata Steel Adventure Foundation (TSAF)
Founded by legendary mountaineer Ms. Bachendri Pal, first Indian woman to climb Mt Everest on May 23, 1984, Tata Steel Adventure Foundation is an outbound leadership institute which through its wide range of activities aims at developing able leaders for the future through identification of their limits of mental and physical endurance. It allows people from all walks of life and all ages to choose their own metaphor for self-discovery. True to its philosophy of experimental learning, TSAF believes that no classroom is better than nature and no teacher is better than your own will.

In addition to the TSAF outbound leadership program, several other courses are conducted by TSAF like horse riding, parasailing, water sports, sports climbing, rock climbing, and many others. Each course is a certification course thereby giving a sense of fulfillment and achievement at the end of it.

About Tata Steel
Tata Steel Group is among the top global steel companies with an annual crude steel capacity of 27.5 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) as on March 31, 2018. It is one of the world's most geographically-diversified steel producers, with operations in 26 countries and a commercial presence in over 50 countries. The Group recorded a consolidated turnover of US $20.41 billion (INR 133,016 crore) in FY18. Tata Steel Group is spread across five continents with an employee base of over 65,000. Tata Steel retained Industry Leader position in FY18 and ranked second overall in the DJSI assessment, 2017. The Company has been recognised as the Climate Disclosure Leader in ‘Steel category’ by CDP (2017). Besides being a member of the World Steel Climate Action Programme, Tata Steel was felicitated with several awards including the Prime Minister’s Trophy for the best performing integrated steel plant for 2014-15 and 2015-16, Best Risk Management by CNBC TV18 (2018) and ‘Corporate Strategy Award’ by Mint (2018). The Company also received the ‘Most Ethical Company’ award from Ethisphere Institute for the sixth time (2018), Steel Sustainability Champions (2017) by the World Steel Association, Dun & Bradstreet Corporate Awards (2017 & 2018), Golden Peacock HR Excellence Award by Institute of Directors (2017) as well as 'Asia's Best Integrated Report' award by the Asia Sustainability Reporting Awards (2017), among several others.

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