Women and Child Development (WCD) Minister Maneka Gandhi plans to write to the States for up-gradation of crèches, timely payments to anganwadi workers and training for all staff members in-charge of children.
In a meeting with members of by Indian Council for Child Welfare (ICCW), the umbrella body of NGOs and non-profit organisations working for child welfare, Maneka assured swift action to better the condition of crèches and children homes.
“In the meeting the ICCW members highlighted several problems being faced by them including low honorarium given to creche workers and helpers, difficulty in setting up of creches in conflict areas, and outstanding payments to anganwadi trainers by the State Governments among others,” said an official from WCD.
Maneka flayed the State Governments for adopting “careless and irresponsible” attitude in payments of anganwadi workers. She also blamed the states for poor training of anganwadi workers.
“The training of anganwadi workers is also not up to the mark as they lack in knowledge about cleanliness, hygiene and good quality food to children,” said Maneka at the meeting.
“It is a serious matter that the State Governments are adopting a careless and irresponsible attitude towards making timely payments to Anganwadi workers and trainers for the services rendered by them,” she said.
She also asked ICCW members to submit a formal representation to the ministry giving details of issues and action needed so that the matter could be taken up with the Finance Ministry as well as with the state governments.
Meanwhile, Maneka said malnutrition has been building-up because the institutions providing services to children have been going down systematically for the last many years and there is now an urgent need to revamp it.
She further asked the members of ICCW, which runs 5,300 creches in 450 districts of the country, to study the map of severe malnutrition areas and formulate a strategy to deal with it.