Barwani Strikes on Malnutrition by Launching ‘Dry Fruits Laddus’

BHOPAL / In a bid to reduce malnutrition among children in tribal district Barwani of Madhya Pradesh, the collector of the district, Shivraj Singh has taken an initiative to provide Dry Fruits Laddus to the Severe Acute Malnourished(SAM) kids at Nutritional Rehabilitation Centres (NRCs) under Mission Bal Shakti(MBS), a district-level holistic programme to deal with this problem.

Banknote Press Dewas has given financial assistance of Rs 1 crore to the aspirant district, Barwani on the collector’s proposal for MBS under Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR). Barwani has more than 70 per cent tribal population and is one of the districts of the country that are selected under the Aspirational District Programme scheme of the NITI Aayog.

The launching ceremony of MBS was held on the occasion of the establishment day of Madhya Pradesh on 1 November and the chief guest of the event was the district in-charge minister, Hardeep Singh Dung.

“We have noticed that after discharging from the NRCs, most of the parents of the children are unable to provide healthy food to them due to this they become again malnourished. So, the district administration has decided to provide nutritious food to them for forty-five days at home”, Shivraj Singh told The Sun Today.

“The Severe Acute Malnourished kids are being provided with a packet of three-kilogram Laddu (made from sixteen kinds of dry fruits and pure Ghee) every fifteen days at the NRCs so that they could be saved from malnutrition even at their homes”, the collector said.

“Eradicating malnutrition is a priority to the chief minister, so we are leaving no stone unturned to reduce it by taking several initiatives. Apart from this, we have taken several steps like close monitoring, spreading awareness etc. in the tribal district”, the collector added.

Apart from this, the collector has set up Toys Banks at the NRCs with public participation to attract the SAM children for admission. New clothes, sweets, biscuits, chocolates, toffees, cakes are also being provided to the admitted children to the NRCs by the NGOs and social organisations.

After making these efforts, the Barwani district has been bagging the first position in the state in bed occupancy of SAM kids in the NRCs for the last ten months. There are 6 NRCs are set up in the district

According to the community-based management of severe acute malnutrition survey, the Women and Child Development (WCD) department has identified 1655 kids who are severely acute malnourished and 15,956 children are moderate acute malnourished among the 185,660 kids of age group 0 to 5 years in the district.

National Family Health Survey-4 (NFHS-4 ) reports stated that MP has the highest percentage (55, compared to 41 per cent of the national average) of malnutrition among children under five years of age across the country. According to reports, 37 per cent of children were malnourished in the Barwani district. The district was second-worst after Sheopur in the state. The NFHS-5 report is still awaited.

The ‘Mission Bal Shakti’ programme made for a holistic approach to deal with the problem of malnutrition in the district has been architected by Ajay Kumar Gupta, assistant director WCD department, Barwani.

Barwani has become the first district in the state where such kind nutritious food as dry fruits Laddus are being provided to SAM children at the NRCs.

According to the recently released bulletin of Sample Registration System (SRS), IMR (infant mortality rate) is the highest(46 infant deaths per thousand lives birth) in Madhya Pradesh.

Malnutrition has always been a major problem in the tribal districts of the state but now the Barwani administration has started to make holistic efforts to strike the problem. IMR and MMR (maternal mortality rate) have witnessed a decline in the district. The administration has also launched the ‘Mission Ummeed’ initiative with the help of WCD to promote institutional deliveries. It has been witnessed a dramatic change in the district in increasing the rate of institutional delivery.