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Sunday, May 15, 2005

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Incentives for anganwadi workers recommended

Staff Correspondent

They are now involved in census surveys, polio eradication campaigns or other Government programmes

NEW DELHI: Minister of State for Women and Child Development Kanti Singh has recommended incentives for any additional work that the anganwadi workers are made to do.

Talking to reporters here over the weekend, Ms. Singh said the services of anganwadi workers, employed under the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS), were used during census surveys, polio eradication campaigns or other Government programmes, without giving them any extra money. "I feel that any extra work done by anganwadi workers should be adequately compensated,'' she said. The Madhya Pradesh Government recently put the responsibility of preventing child marriages on anganwadi workers on "Akshaya Tritiya'' on May 11. An anganwadi worker, Shakuntala Verma, lost both her hands following a violent attack on her when she tried to prevent a child marriage in Dhar district.

The anganwadi workers are given a meagre honorarium of Rs. 1,000 while a helper is paid Rs. 500 for running an anganwadi centre four hours daily. The amount was increased in 2003 from Rs. 500 and Rs. 300 respectively. They are now also covered under a group insurance scheme. The Women and Child Development Department had a budgetary allocation of Rs. 2,400 crores in 2004-05 which has been increased to Rs. 3,875 crores in 2005-06, the bulk of which goes to ICDS.

Outside ICDS, the Women and Child Department runs 30,000 creches each costing about Rs. 4,500.

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