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Reporting babies

Anil Kapoor has found a brand he wants to endorse — Indian children! RANA SIDDIQUI writes

FOR A CAUSE Govind Nihalani (left) brought Anil Kapoor to endorse the UBR initiative Photo: V. V. KRISHNAN

Approximately 26 million births take place every year in India. Some 12 million births don't get registered. The reasons are lack of awareness, problems of travelling the distance to the registration centres, complicated and time-consuming process or sheer lethargy.

After a through research that revealed startling facts about the lack of birth registration in India, Plan India, a 10-year-old independent, child-centred, non-government organisation launched a nationwide campaign on Universal Birth Registration - UBR - in New Delhi, this past week.

Celebrities for effect

The campaign that aims to achieve 100 per cent birth registration by 2010 has roped in film star Anil Kapoor as its goodwill ambassador. Besides, filmmaker Govind Nihalani, who is also a board member of Plan India, is helping spread the message of birth registration in every nook and cranny of the country. Nihalani, who has directed two small films for the campaign, will be dubbing them in various regional languages.

"We started working for the campaign in 2005. It was painful to know that only 58 per cent of births and 54.5 per cent deaths are registered in India. And only 19 per cent of children under five years of age have birth certificates. The lack of a birth certificate makes them a victim of trafficking, child labour, early marriage and also hampers their entrance into various service sectors. So we roped in these celebrities to direct attention to the campaign," said Bhagyashri Dengle, Executive Director, Plan India, at the launch.

Bhagyashri, who played the lead in Nihalani's film Aakrosh more than a couple of decades ago, explained that it was Nihalani who furthered the idea of registration and designed the campaign.

No money please!

"He didn't take even a single penny for this additional responsibility. He also got Anil Kapoor for us. Anil also didn't charge a penny," she says.

Nihalani, explaining the campaign, said, "The most challenging task was to make the campaign reach the masses in the simplest language. The script was already worked upon by Plan India. We shot 90 seconds of film, in 60 and 30 seconds each. These will be aired on all channels."

Anil, all ready for a new role, made many laugh by saying he thought Govind Nihalani came to him with an offer of a film when the former went to see him at his residence. "As Govind ji explained to me the reason for the campaign, I realised how ignorant I was about it. I felt very ashamed and immediately said yes to this cause. I was emotionally charged while delivering the monologue for the film. Before this campaign, I didn't endorse any brand because I didn't believe in them."

Bruno Oudimayor, Country Director, Plan International, said that efforts are on to take help from the Indian Government to make the task of birth registration hassle-free. "In Orissa, for example, we took the gram panchayat into confidence. It took care of the hassles of distance and persuading people to go for birth registration of their children. We are doing it at two levels: creating demand and then infrastructure for an easy flow of the supply of this service. We are also planning to make the form registration-friendly."

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