Out of the first series of super thermal power stations taken up by National Thermal Power Corporation, Farakka has earned the unique distinction of becoming the first power plant of the corporation to be completely built by in-house design engineering. NTPC Farakka is situated on the banks of river Ganga by the West Bank of Feeder Canal, 300 km north of Calcutta, in Murshidabad district in West Bengal.

The project had the privilege of its foundation stone being laid by former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi on December 29, 1981. The project area including temporary township has been named Nabarun, the field hostel complex Shuvarun and the permanent township at Khejuriaghat in Malda district rechristened Pubarun.
Envisaged to have an installed capacity of 1600 MW, the project has been implemented in two stages. In the first stage 3X200 MW units were set, while the second stage saw the commissioning of 2X500 MW units.

The first unit of the 1^st stage was commissioned on January 1, 1986, the second on December 24, 1986 and the third on August 6, 1987. The first 500 MW unit of the second stage became operational on September 25, 1992, while the second 500 MW unit was commissioned on March 7, 1994. These 500 MW units are first in Eastern India.

All the five units are now under commercial operation. The station generated 6792 Million Units with an availability factor of 85.51% in 1999-2000.
The coal requirement is met from the Lalmatia coal mines of Rajmahal coalfields of the Eastern Coalfields Limited, in Bihar, and is transported to Farakka by the self owned and operated, 85 km long Merry Go Round Railway System (MGR).
The power generated at Farakka is supplied to Bihar, Orissa, Sikkim, DVC, besides West Bengal via eastern grid. Now the power is being supplied to Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, NER and UP as well.
Two tall chimneys (174 mtr. And 275 mtr. High), electrostatic precipitators with efficiency to the tune of 99.5% and a green belt of nearly 20 lakh trees help keep the environment clean and healthy. The up coming waste treatment plant and the dry ash extraction systems are some of the fresh anti pollution measures under implementation.

The fly ash generated is now being gainfully utilized for the manufacture of alum, as substitute for sand in mortar, asbestos and brick making, land filling, etc. A total of 1,87,000 MT of ash was thus utilized in the last financial year.
Being a responsible corporate citizen, Farakka has developed two vicinity villages of Andua and Chandipur into model ones, besides constructing, repairing and renovating school buildings, roads, drains and passenger sheds at bus stands. Several tube wells sunk in the neighbouring villages provide clean drinking water. Free medical camps are regularly organized for the local people.
Solar heaters and solar lights have been installed at the model villages and way side MGR stations of Kumarpur. A solar energy driven pump has been pressed into operation at Salve Udyan, within the plant premises, as an energy conservation effort.

Pubarun, Nabarun and Shuvarun, the three lush green townships cater to the housing needs of the employees. The townships are equipped with all modern civic and recreational facilities like indoor and outdoor stadium, parks, auditorium, boating points, swimming pool, Cable TV, library, etc. Banks, Post Office, shopping complex, besides the three schools, Delhi Public School, Kendriya Vidyalaya and NTPC High School are all situated within the townships. Truly enough, NTPC Farakka is a glowing testimony to the unity in diversity of he India polity.