Dept indifference hits maternity benefit scheme in western dists
SLOW PACE Till June 10, Jaisalmer achieved only 21% of the target under PMMVY, while Barmer achieved 26% BARMER:
Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY), the Union government’s ambitious maternity benefit scheme, is moving at a snail’s pace in western Rajasthan due to theapathy of the Integrated Child DevelopmentService(ICDS)department.
Barmer and Jaisalmer districts are placed at the bottom of the list, that is, at 32nd and 33rd position respectively, in implementation of the PMMVY in Rajasthan. Till June 10 this year, Jaisalmer achieved only 21% of the target under the scheme, while Barmer achieved 26%.
Similarly, among other western districts of Rajasthan, Jalore is at the 31st position (with 30%achievement), Pali at 30th (37%) Sirohi at 29th (39%), Jodhpur at 27th (42%) and Nagaur is at 26th position (42%).
PMMVY is an extension of the Indira Gandhi Matritva Sahyog Yojana (IGMSY). In December 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced to extend IGMSY — then an existing pilot scheme being implemented across 53 districts — in the country. PMMVY was approved by the Union Cabinet in May 2017 and was rolled out the same year in September.
The scheme aims at providing partial compensation to women against wage loss during their pregnancy. Under the scheme, pregnant women and lactating mothers are offered a cash incentive of ₹5,000 after the birth of their first child to reduce maternal mortality and malnutrition among children.
Of the total incentive, ₹1,000 is provided on registration of the pregnant women under 150 days of last menstrual period, followed by ₹2,000 given after anti-natal checkup of the woman and ₹2,000 on delivery and completion of the first round of immunisation of the infant. While the western districts in Rajasthan are struggling to implement PMMVY, Ganganagar and Hanumangarh districts of the state have shown big success. With 103% achievement against the allotted target Hanumangarh leads the tally, while Ganganagar stands at second position with 92% achievement.
The state capital, Jaipur, is on the eighth position with 66% achievement.
ICDS department’s negligence in Barmer can be witnessed from the figures that out of the total 3,514 anganwadi centres, 1,628 centres have not done a single registration under PMMVY.
According to the expected target, an average of eight cases should have been registered at each anganwadi centre in the district. Against the allotted target of 28,360 cases, the ICDS department in Barmer has been able to register only 7,299 cases till June 10. Jaisalmer registered 1,216 cases against the target of 6,656.
Similarly, Jalore registered 3,159 cases against 15,072, Pali 4,491 against 14,576, Sirohi 2,574 against 7,472 and Jodhpur registered 7,201 cases against the target of 20,264.
Sati Choudhary, deputy director at ICDS department in Barmer, said that her office was not able to achieve the target due to shortage of staff and also the fact that the area is remote. “In many cases we are facing problems with documents such as Aadhaar card, bank details etc,” she said, adding that she has taken note of the issue and asked the field staff and supervisors to speed up the process.
Refuting ICDS department’s version, Vijay Sharma, a health activist, said that out of total 3,514 anganwadi centres, merely 5% centres are not working.
“With such a statement (from Sati Choudhary) the department is trying to hide its failure and negligence,” he said. Sharma claimed that situation of other schemes in the ICDS department were the same and corrupt practices in the department are the reasons behind it.