Oil India Limited under CSR had launched ‘OIL Shakti’, a community-based sanitary napkin production & marketing unit at Hijuguri, Tinsukia district on 23^rd December 2020. The unit was inaugurated & the intervention was launched by Dilip Kr. Bhuyan, CGM-PA, OIL along with Tridiv Hazarika, DGM-CSR & CC, OIL and Nayana Madhu Dutta, Senior Manager-CSR, OIL in the presence of Schoolnet India Zonal Head Nivedita Barthakur, staff, field workers and SAATHIYA club members.

For carrying out mass awareness against the stigma associated with menstruation, a comic book based on scientific facts in Assamese language was also released which will be distributed at the schools, colleges and community level. The unit will be managed by a large network of rural women for promotion of Menstrual Health & Hygiene Management amongst the vulnerable communities such as adolescent girls, pregnant women, lactating mothers & rural women in the reproductive age-group as well as men under Project OIL Arogya for reduction of IMR & MMR in OIL’s operational areas of Upper Assam.

The word ‘Shakti’ meaning sacred force or empowerment signifies the fact that menstrual health & hygiene (H&H) is at the core of women empowerment, equity and rights. ‘OIL Shakti’ is expected to create the outcome of an ecosystem of overarching knowledge & necessity of menstrual H&H, awareness of both the genders, affordability, availability of informed choices while also laying a thrust on the enhancement of livelihood opportunities.

‘OIL Shakti’ shall endeavour to act upon the issues of (a) access & disposal (b) limited awareness & (c) social stigma surrounding menstrual H&H. In order to forge a way forward, the unit will be a community model for meeting local demands affordably with the economic viability of creating livelihood & financial opportunities across the value chain. The community model will look at (a) an affordable product (b) local production (c) community distribution (d) mass awareness on behaviour change communication and (e) production of environment friendly & biodegradable sanitary napkins.