Thaindian News

New Delhi, March 10 (IANS) The government will revise the rates for the supplementary nutrition programme in aganwadis in tune with the high inflation, parliament was told Thursday.

Replying to supplementary questions in the Rajya Sabha, Women and Child Development Minister Krishna Tirath said the Consumer Price Index (CPI) will be taken into account to calculate the necessary amount for food in the anganwadis.

“The government proposes to strengthen and restructure the ICDS (Integrated Child Development Services). This will, inter-alia, include indexation of cost with CPI, special focus on pregnant and lactating mothers and children under 3 years for care during pregnancy and Infant and Young Child Feeding (IYCF) Practices,” she said.

“The norms for supplementary nutrition were earlier revised by the government of India in 2008-09. As per the revised norms, Rs.4 per beneficiary per day is prescribed for children of 6-72 months, Rs.6 per beneficiary per day for severely malnourished children (6-72 months) and Rs.5 per beneficiary per day for pregnant and nursing mothers,” she said.

The minister said that the need for enhancement of rates according to the CPI was expressed in a meeting of state ministers in January this year.

“Strong institutional convergence with National Rural Health Mission and Total Sanitation Campaign, particularly, at the district and village levels and development of models for providing flexibility at local levels for community participation is also proposed,” she added,

Krishna Tirath also said that the government was trying to ensure that anganwadi workers do not have to do extra work like that of census.

“Anganwadi workers have to do census work, but we are trying to bring it in a mission mode so that they don’t have to do other things and can focus on the anganwadi work alone,” she said.