The Tata group, which has been involved in community building and philanthropy for nearly as long as its existence, keeps a tab on the kind of innovative products that their employees make an effort to design.

"This is just one aspect of community building. We do not want to just give the product to the community but we want to help it build it. So these product designs are studied and some are commercialised so that the same model can be replicated by the group anywhere else and even used by other entities," says general manager, group corporate social responsibility, Tata Council for Community Initiatives, Anant Nadkarni.

One such major programme is Tata Consultancy Service’s (TCS) literacy programme. Piloted in Andhra Pradesh, the company is imparting functional literacy through computer based training software to inculcate reading skills in a time span of 10 to 12 weeks. The objective of this experiment is to teach people how to recognise words instead of letters.

These inputs manifest in the learning module as visually stimulating settings borrowing from the puppet show idiom accompanies by audio commentaries, impressing on the students the importance of words.

This particular programme, done in conjunction with the Government of Andhra Pradesh in the village of Guntur, was completed successfully. Seeing the maximum utilisation of multi media channels, TCS is now ready to roll out a similar programme in other states in different languages. Modules in Hindi and Tamil are ready to be launched.

This, according to TCS, will encourage people to study since it is an innovation rather than the traditional fashion of teaching people to read. The idea is that if the person can recognise 300 to 500 words, then he will be able to read at least one fourth of a newspaper. The timeframe is 10 to 12 weeks.

The method developed by TCS was twofold: multimedia lessons with the aid of computers and flash cards with letters printed on them giving them the confidence to read and also through the posters and newspapers.

"Instead of using the traditional adult literacy models, this unique approach has helped TCS to even train the early students into teaching other students," says a TCS employee who helped out in this programme.

Another product from the TCS stable is a water filter made from rice husk that is abundantly available in rural townships. It has shown a good record of reducing the bacteria and its muddiness.

The water got from this filter, has also been tested by the Tata research development and design centre (TRDDC).TRDDC has found the water from these filters to be better than the water that these villages get by taps.

A ‘do-it-yourself’ kind of filter, it is one of the cheapest available among the commercial filters. This filter, which conforms to World Health Organisation (WHO) is currently in the process of being rolled out across the country.

Another innovative product from the Tata’s stable, is a endoskeleton lower limb prosthesis, designed and manufactured by Telco Automaton limited. This design approved by the Artifical Limb Centre , "is the closest thing to walking naturally" Cited to be better than the Jaipur foot, it allows bendability of the limb, something the Jaipur foot did not allow easily.

The Tata companies are looking to increase awareness about this product.Tisco is also very active is utilising its research products for the betterment of the community where it is present.

It has started provided fabricated low cost housing of steel, which it is currently pushing for various utility structures like pumphouses and security cabins. TISCO has also constructed and installed specially made silos so that there is less loss during storage.

"We are sensitising the various larger group companies to this particular way of construction. They could also use it at various places like their plants, factories and townships. Till then, it is not being promoted in a large way outside the group, " said Nadkarni.