Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has urged three of his Union Ministry colleagues to send a fact-finding team to ascertain the factors behind the malnutrition death of 19 children at Nagada village in Jajpur district in the span of a few months.
Pradhan wrote three separate letters to Health Minister JP Nadda, Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi and Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram urging them to send teams from their Ministries go to Nagada.
On-the-spot visits have indicated that the deaths were due to severe malnutrition and lack of healthcare at the village inhabited by primitive Juang tribal community, he said.
“Despite National Food Security Act being in force, hunger deaths in the mineral-rich and industrially progressive district is shocking. It has come to light that the village has been left out of all developmental schemes. Exclusion of tribals from the NFS Act, ICDS programme and MNREGA have led to increased impoverishment,” said Pradhan.
He said that though the village is inhabited by tribals, the villagers have not been allotted forest land under the Forest Rights Act.
“There is no road connectivity to Nagada. The tribals use forest track and cover 10 km by walking to get any service or benefit available under various scheme,” said he.
Pradhan further said it is a matter of regret that 45,536 children in Odisha are suffering from acute malnutrition out of which 894 are from Jajpur.