An initiative called ‘Pukar Abhiyan’ that was started in the Bikaner district of Rajasthan in April this year, with the aim of saving the lives of pregnant ladies and their newborn babies and provide proper nutrition to them, has impacted the lives of more than 1.50 lakhs women so far. The Pukar initiative involves providing better nutrition to the mother, taking care of the health of the child, teaching the art of staying healthy in life to adolescent girls, and many other things that can provide a better life to women.
This scheme has created a much needed awareness toward nutrition in the district. Under this initiative, Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition meetings cum schools are organized every Wednesday in one village and one ward. In these meetings, information about the various related schemes of the government, as also the precautions to be taken and tests to be done during pregnancy, institutional deliveries, the necessary vaccinations for the child, etc., is handed out.
Indian Masterminds interacted with the officer behind the initiative, the District Collector of Bikaner, Bhagwati Prasad Kalal, IAS, to get more details.
THE PUKAR INITIATIVE
The 2011-batch IAS officer said, “The main objective of this initiative is to reduce the Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) and Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR). Along with this, another important aspect of this initiative is to give complete information about how to take full care of the child and the mother from conception till the child turns 2 years old, that is, about 1000 days. Because in these thousand days, the brain of the child develops, that is why the nutrition of mother and child is very important in these days.”
Since during this period, it is important to take care of the health of both the mother and child, and take nutritional precautions, awareness is created about the right kind of food for proper nutrition, the vaccinations to be taken and at what intervals, etc. For ease of operation, the work has been broken up into two divisions – administrative part and the IEC model.
ADMINISTRATIVE PART
Bikaner is a desert district with large villages. So each village has been divided into three parts. One part is taken care of by an Asha worker, another will be looked after by an Anganwadi worker, and the third one by Sahyogini and Saathin. And all three will be supervised by the ANM. All of them are allotted the area where they themselves live as they have complete information about it. Their task is to maintain information about their respective area, from new marriages to pregnancy and delivery, in a register. The information is then recorded by the ANM for reaching out to the target beneficiaries.
IEC Model
Under this division, meetings are held in all the wards of cities and all the panchayats of villages with the women beneficiaries such as pregnant women, adolescent girls, etc and they are provided with information on a host of topics related to marriage, pregnancy and motherhood. “For this, we have prepared a 7-page document. We spread information and listen to their problems,” Mr. Prasad said.
The meeting takes place every Wednesday. There are around 367 gram panchayats and 190 wards, so, 520 meetings are held on that day where almost 10 thousand beneficiaries attend and share their views.Eligible women take iron and folic acid tablets in front of everyone in the meeting so that the fear to take those supplements banish from the minds of other women.
All this is done in order to create awareness and instill confidence in the whole community towards guided nutrition. In the meetings, doctors and nurses from the Medical and Health Department and Anganwadi workers of the Department of Women and Child Development, Asha Sahyogin and Saathin interact with pregnant and lactating women as well as adolescent girls. The dialogue is both ways – the representatives of the department give their point of view and also answer the queries of the participants.
More than six thousand meetings have been organized so far and there has been direct communication with more than 1.5 lakh women since the launch of the initiative in April 6 this year.
HOME MEETING
The most significant feature of this campaign is that the meetings are organized at the home of a pregnant or lactating woman. On an average, ten thousand women are being communicated with every week. Thus, organising such a big event without any extra cost is setting an example by itself.
CMHO ENGAGEMENT
The Chief Medical Health Officer of the district (CMHO), Dr BL Meena, is actively engaged in taking this campaign to the masses. In the meetings, women and girls are tested for haemoglobin deficiency and in case of anemia, iron folic acid tablets are fed to them on the spot. So far, more than five lakh tablets have been distributed in such meetings.
Due to the continuous efforts of the district administration, positive results have started appearing at the initial stage itself, that is sure to improve further in the coming days. The overall target is to make this campaign a milestone in terms of protecting the health of women and adolescent girls.
