Hon’ble Minister Thiru. Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi Launches Avtar Group’s ‘Nipuni’, Career Readiness Program for Girl Students in Colleges

Hon’ble Minister Thiru. Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi, Minister for School Education in Tamil Nadu, launched Nipuni, a career readiness programme, created by Avtar Human Capital Trust (AHCT). The Minister was the chief guest at the 12th Edition of Udyog Utsav, a unique one-day career visioning conference for the girl students who are part of AHCT’s Project Puthri, which is a life skills training program conducted exclusively for girls studying in government and corporation schools across Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Bengaluru.

Hon’ble Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi Launches Avtar Group’s ‘Nipuni’, Career Readiness Program for Girl Students in Colleges

Taking a step further, AHCT’s Nipuni Career Pathing is a transformative career readiness program aimed at empowering college-going girls by enhancing their career opportunities and fostering a skilled, self-reliant workforce capable of thriving in corporate India

The Minister also distributed awards for educational institutions who run Project Puthris training programs, in the presence of Dr. Saundarya Rajesh, Managing Trustee, AHCT; Shri CA. Venkatesh R, Secretary and Correspondent, and Dr. M. Pitchaimani, Principal, Srimad Andavan Arts and Science College, Trichy. The event saw the participation of over 400 students from about nine schools.

Hon’ble Minister Thiru. Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi highlighted Avtar’s commitment to bridging gender gaps in education and in corporate India. Avtar Group, the parent organization of AHCT, also revealed the key findings from its latest research study, “The Career Connection: Demystifying Success for Young Women in India’s Emerging Workforce”, that sheds light on the unique motivations, challenges, and aspirations of first-generation women graduates.

Talking about AHCT’s initiatives, Dr. Saundarya Rajesh, Managing Trustee, AHCT, and Founder-President of Avtar Group, said, “We are thrilled to launch Nipuni at the 12th Udyog Utsav. Nipuni Career Pathing aligns seamlessly with the Prime Ministers Internship Program, a national initiative providing youth with practical exposure across diverse sectors. Our recent research underscores the strong aspirations among young women to pursue meaningful careers when equipped with adequate resources. Through Nipuni Career Pathing, we aim to empower these ambitions by imparting critical skills that ensure workforce readiness. In partnership with industry leaders, the program offers specialized training in communication, leadership, project management, and Information Technology, bridging the essential gap between education and employment. Nipuni aims to prepare young women to thrive in today’s competitive job market. The initiative will launch with 10 pilot projects in Tamil Nadu, with a vision to enable 10,000 college-going girls to successfully transition into white-collar careers over the next three years.“

Commenting on Project Puthri (AHCT’s flagship program) she highlighted that the initiative has positively transformed the lives of over 12,000 underprivileged girls across Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, and Karnataka. The program fosters career ambition by providing mentorship and essential skills training that empower these girls for professional success and financial independence. “We have partnerships with over 130 schools. We enroll girls from economically and socially underprivileged backgrounds -such as orphans, children of single parents, and others – starting from grades 8 through 12 in this program. Through a curriculum of 40 life skills focused on building career intentionality, the program offers role-modeling sessions and mentorship in areas like leadership, critical thinking, and resilience. Each week, participants receive 1 to 1.5 hours of training. Additionally, Puthri provides career coaching for 10th to 12th-grade students, tailor made based on psychometric assessments of the students.”

AHCT also provides scholarships to support girls in higher education. In the academic year of 2022-23 alone, it offered Rs. 50 lakhs in scholarships for students pursuing vocational courses, arts and science programs, and engineering diplomas and degrees. The Trust is a non-profit organization committed to bridging the gender gap in India’s workforce by providing career guidance, training, and mentorship to girls from underprivileged communities. AHCT is part of Avtar Group, a leading diversity, equity, and inclusion consulting firm with an overarching vision of increasing women’s workforce participation in India Inc.

About Project Puthri

Project Puthri was launched to redesign the destinies of girl children in 2017. Puthri is India’s first ever developmental project that seeks to create Career Intentionality among 10,000 underprivileged girl students in the age group of 13 to 18 years studying in government schools across India, every year.

About Avtar Human Capital Trust

Avtar Human Capital Trust (AHCT) is a not for-profit public charitable organization, working in the field of economic empowerment of women. Headquartered in Chennai, AHCT has been addressing gender equality, poverty eradication and inclusive economic growth for women across the State of Tamil Nadu & Pondicherry over the past eight years.

About Avtar

Avtar, set up in 2000, is India’s first diversity advocate & workplace inclusion expert. Stepping into its 25th glorious year, renowned for the extensive work in the space of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) and more specifically, women’s workforce participation, Avtar is now an ISO 20700 Certified firm. Under the visionary leadership of Dr Saundarya Rajesh, Avtar has ventured into areas of gender inclusion and career creation, which are firsts to India, including:

Creating platforms for second career women to meet potential employers,

Developing a comprehensive set of career enablers which companies can implement in their workspaces

Spearheading original research that has provided cutting edge insights to organization

Creating India’s largest diversity benchmarking platform – Avtar & Seramount 100 Best Companies for women in India

Creating India’s first diversity hiring portal myavtar.com for women, LGBTQ, PWD, Veterans and Silver Generation

Re-Skilling, Up-skilling and Counselling of women to pursue sustainable career paths and

Building career intentionality amongst under privileged girl children

Avtar has built its DEI offerings under Six EDs, which ensures that every organization can have a clear path towards moving forward, building and sustaining diverse, equitable and inclusive workplaces. The Six EDs – Enrich Diversity, Embed Diversity, Enable Diversity, Experience Diversity, Extend Diversity and Endow Diversity are constructed along six key implementation dimensions of Diversity – for Assessments & Advisory support, Recruitment Programs, Workshops and Training Programs, Conferences and Events, Empowering Supplier Diversity & Inclusion and supporting inclusion of under-privileged communities, respectively. For its transformational impact in the realm of DEI, Avtar Group was listed in the prestigious Steward Leadership 25 Listing by Strait Times & INSEAD at Singapore in 2022.

To know more, visit www.avtarinc.com | www.myavtar.com

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