23 The Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS )

Ms. Kumudini Pati

epgp books

 

Introduction

 

The role and position of the mother with regard to her child is so fundamental that any scheme that targets children must perforce impact and involve the mother. The concerns of the scheme are wide in their reach and women are covered in it in their roles as mothers and would -be mothers. Therefore this module has been included in this paper. It examines the ICDS, enumerating the pros and cons of this ambitious scheme and critiquing its performance in the states.

 

History and Background of the Scheme

 

Launched in 1975 on Mahatma Gandhi‘s birthday, i.e. the 2nd of October ,the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS ) represents one of the world’s largest and most unique programmes for early childhood development and is the foremost symbol of India’s commitment to her children. Commendable in its intention, the purpose of the scheme is to provide pre-school education on the one hand and break the vicious cycle of malnutrition, morbidity resulting in reduced learning capacity and mortality, on the other. It also has to take care of all the needs of pregnant and lactating mothers, as well as their babies.

 

The Journey of the ICDS is as follows:

 

Our society has failed the children in the country, especially those who belong to the deprived and marginalised sections of society. In terms of nutrition and education thousands of children get almost nothing, despite tall claims by the Government. They certainly require the special attention of the Ministry by way of proper mechanisms for monitoring the Scheme and making it functional. In fact the idea of introducing schemes targeting children is an old one and it has been preceded by several schemes and projects before this particular one appeared.

 

As early as 1954, Balvadis1 were started at the village level for pre-primary school children. Thirteen years later, in 1967, a new project was initiated in the name of Women and Child Welfare. This was followed in 1970 by the Mid-day-meal programme2.

 

It was finally in 1975, that 33 child welfare projects in 33 blocks and 4891 Anganwadi Centres of rural, urban and tribal areas were sanctioned by the then Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi and the ICDS was started on a trial basis for 5 years. In Delhi, the Jama Masjid Project was a milestone project of the country and now there are 11150 Anganwadi Centres in Delhi, since its inception in 1975-76

 

Aims of the ICDS.

 

Enlisted below are the aims of the ICDS3. It is quite obvious that with the given resources, manpower and infrastructure, the expectations from the ICDS are quite unrealistic, far too ambitious and hence, not likely to be fulfilled. However the stated aims are :

  1. To provide basic services at the community level and ensure the all-round development of 0-6 year-old children, i.e. to improve their nutritional and health status.
  2. To give priority in the care to the vulnerable age group  of pre-birth to 3 year old children
  3. To lay the foundation for proper psychological, physical and social development of the child
  4. To reduce the incidence of mortality, morbidity and malnutrition4 as well as school-dropout rate
  5. To end disparities among groups ( the scheme was to target poor and marginalized sections of society)
  6. To work at convergence interface between other factors like health care, education and sanitation.
  7. To break the generations-old cycle of malnutrition
  8. To address problems of adolescent girls5 and women
  9. To take care of the education and training, health check- ups, and mental health check-ups so that adolescent girls may grow up to be trained, healthy, aware and empowered women/mothers in the future.(Also, so that when they become pregnant, they are healthy and physically as well as mentally mature women, so that they can give birth to healthy babies. For this purpose, the Rajiv Gandhi Sabala Yojana6 was implemented through the ICDS, and through this scheme adolescent girls were provided with supplementary nutrition, a health check-up, training and programmes for empowerment. But this scheme is non-functional for the present.)
  10. To provide supplementary nutrition for pregnant women, vaccination, health check-ups, balanced diet, safe delivery, institutional delivery feeding the first milk or colostrum to the infant etc.

 

Although the aims are quite high-sounding, it seems impossible to achieve all this without a fool-proof mechanism of monitoring for proper implementation of the scheme

 

For example, where there is paucity of funds, what is to be done to increase sanction of monetary support? How the sanctioned money is being spent also has to be monitored. Besides, regular surveys are to be conducted to check the condition of functional Anganwadis, the delay in construction of new centres, the recruitment and training of staff, the cases of corruption and nepotism which may or may not have been reported.

 

Funding & Universalization of the Scheme

 

In the year 2001, the ICDS was first universalised through an interim order of the Supreme Court of India, dated 28 November 2001. This Order was reiterated and extended on 29 April and 7 October, 2004 with further directions on ICDS7 .The ICDS was universalized after several such projects were found to be successful. In the financial year 2004-05, 1.88 new Anganwadi Centres were to be opened, but even in 2006, these had not been operationalised. In the past 39 years the ICDS has been expanded to only around 14 lakh Anganwadi centres. One can understand the process as given below.

 

It was after hearing a PUCL Public Interest Litigation on food security, on 1 December, 2006, that the Supreme Court gave a direction for the universalization8 of the ICDS and its linking with food security. The process was to be completed by 2008 and 14 lakh Anganwadi Kendras to cover a population of around 1 billion were to be constructed.

 

Although, the then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram had promised to complete the process by 2012 latest, no proper fund allocation for this was made. In 2007, the Advisor to the Food Security Commissioner said that, to the already allocated Rs. 4087 crores, a measly sum of 700 crores had been added, which actually stood in contempt of the SC directive of doubling the allocation.

 

The NAC under the UPA Government had estimated that an allocation of no less than Rs. 9600 crores each for the years 2006-07 and 2007-08 was required for the universalization of the ICDS. By 2008-09, 13,56,027 AWCs were sanctioned. But the ICDS was still running short of around 3,11,758 functioning Anganwadi Centres. The Government then planned Restructuring and Strengthening of ICDS9 for which a sum of Rs. 1,23,580 crores has been granted for the 12th 5-year plan, i.e. 2012-17. The progress of the objective has still to be seen. Ironically, for a scheme aimed at raising nutrition standards among the children, more than 70% of the total allocation is spent on administrative expenses – salaries to contractual employees, on general expenses and training purposes, while only about 30% of actually spent on providing nourishment to the intended beneficiaries.

 

 

The Administrative Structure

  • The Anganwadi Worker and Anganwadi Helper at the Anganwadi (Village) level
  • The Anganwadi Supervisor at the Sector level
  • The Child Development Project Officer (CDPO) at the Project level
  • The District Programme Officer (DPO) at the District level
  • Directorate of Child Development
  • Department of Women and Child Development, State Govt.
  • Department of Women and Child Development, Govt. of India
  • Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India

 

Work & Responsibilities of the Anganwadi Supervisors and Workers

 

Many tasks have to be performed by the Anganwadi Supervisors, as they are the ones ensuring the implementation of the scheme at the sectoral level. They have to take care of all the needs of the pregnant mother and her child. However, the responsibility to make house visits, supervise the nutrition and ensure safe delivery is that of the ANMs and Asha workers.

 

The mother, with the guidance of the Anganwadi Worker, has to take special care of the infant from birth upto 6 months, giving proper feeds, checking weight, and giving vaccinations.

 

The malnourished children and mothers are referred to hospitals and the Anganwadi Supervisor herself takes them there. Records regarding the condition of the mother and child are maintained at the Anganwadi Centre and are to be updated every month. Infant mortality and Maternal mortality are put under check in this way.

 

Gradation of children as ‘normal’, ‘partially malnourished’ and ‘severely malnourished’ is to be done after weighing them. They are then to be referred to the hospital and a team of doctors are to attend to them. Severely malnourished children are to be given double the amount of nutrition.

 

They have also to ensure:

  • Immunisation of children less than 6 years of age
  • Giving anti-tetanus injection to expectant mothers
  • Supplementary nutrition to children below the age of 6
  • Supplementary nutrition to pregnant and lactating mothers, esp. poor women.
  • Proper nutrition, health check-ups and health-education to women aged 15-45
  • Antenatal care for pregnant mothers
  • Post-natal care of mothers
  • Care for the new born child
  • Referral of serious cases of malnutrition or sickness to PHCs or hospitals
  • Pre-school, non-formal education for children in the 3-5 age group.

 

Besides, these, they are to do yearly surveys, weigh children every month, maintain files, keep reporting to the Supervisors and CDPOs, keep stock of contraceptive and delivery kits, to ensure pulse polio immunisation, to guide the ASHAs and ANMs and to maintain liason with Mahila Mandals, Gram Panchayat heads and PHC staff.

 

 

The Case of the Anganwadi Supervisors

 

The Anganwadi Supervisor is supposed to inspect the Anganwadi Centres in a particular sector and see that they are functioning properly and the ICDS Scheme is being implemented in letter and spirit. But several of these workers are suffering due to lack of any knowledge regarding the policies of the Government, a lack of proper training, so as to be able to understand the problems arising in the implementation of the schemes or gather expertise during field work, and an inability to conduct informed meetings for ensuring proper implementation of the schemes; hence the volunteers develop an ‘employee mentality’, i.e. they mechanically keep working without applying their minds. They are also at a loss regarding changes required for making the scheme successful, because they are not involved in the process of designing any of the schemes. Also, there is no provision for periodical assessment of the problems being faced during implementation of schemes; on the other hand the officials have hardly any experience of the problems being encountered during field work, and hence, are unable to give positive inputs.

 

The Anganwadi Supervisors are made to work in trying conditions and they suffer both due to being responsible for inspection and monitoring of the AWCs, as well as on account of being women. Being Supervisors, they are supposed to have departmental system of transport, which is never available. According to norms, a Supervisor has to be in charge of 25 Centres, but due to lack of appointments, they have to visit 50-60 Centres. After covering them, they are supposed to submit a report at the Project Office, which is around 15-30 kilometres away from the area of work. In tribal areas, no transport is available, due to which the women workers have to go on foot. Many times, untoward incidents occur, or males accompanying them try to take advantage of their vulnerable condition; but the requests of the workers for proper transport fall on deaf ears. They are not even provided with two-wheelers and cannot demand transport costs. When a CDPO has to mobilise Supervisors, and if he/she has no means of transport at his/her disposal, work suffers. The Anganwadi Centres remain neglected10 and are managed in the most callous manner.

 

Anganwadi workers have often complained that the procedure of their appointment is not transparent; hence there is a demand for peoples’ intervention in the entire process from their side. For example, it is extremely difficult to get some of the workers to perform their duties, since their appointments are political.They are wives or daughters of powerful Block Pramukhs and Gram Pradhans, who do not allow them to work outside their homes even if they want to. But the Supervisors and other officials cannot take them to task for fear of their powerful political links. This issue had been taken up with the P.M. by Smt. Chandresh Kumari, M.P., Jodhpur. But so far, there is no solution in sight.

 

According to the Government’s guidelines, every Anganwadi Supervisor has to be accompanied by an Anganwadi worker, so that the process of inspection of Centres and reporting to the Anganwadi Offices becomes easy. But this is rarely observed. The leaders of the Anganwadi Supervisors Association say that the Supervisors are the backbone of the ICDS. But they have to perform tasks which are not allocated to them as per the manual, for example, opening the Centre, doing clerical work of keeping records etc., doing the work allotted to the CDPO, maintaining the store, doing pulse polio and other vaccination work, doing election related work, distributing rations, doing the work of Block Level Officers, doing Widow and Old age Pension related work. Thus, their own responsibilities take a back seat.This has led to Supervisors getting discredited, so that departmental action has been initiated against them in several instances. Gender disparity also exists in terms of honorarium and facilities as well as transport allowance.The clerks, CDPOs and DPOs as well as peons take their T.A. and D.A. but the Anganwadi supervisors, who are basically field workers have to spend from their honorarium for going to different anganwadi centres.

 

Then, there are many Anganwadi workers who have been promoted to Anganwadi Supervisors but actually are not educated enough to qualify for the job. Some are old and infirm and some have chronic health problems, hence they are unable to do field-work. As a result, they begin to depend on male workers-peons, office clerks, drivers and officers, who find it quite convenient to exploit them economically or otherwise. This also leads to unsatisfactory performance and poor quality of work in ICDS. The younger worker-recruits who have been appointed in the 1985-87 batch are better educated and are able to give a much better performance. It would improve the quality of work considerably, if they were promoted to the post of Supervisors and the ICDS would immensely benefit from this.

 

Problems of the CDPOs and DPOs

 

These officers are under the bureaucratic control of the District Magistrate, hence can take no decisions on their own. Even to decide how much rent can be paid for an Anganwadi Centre cannot be decided by them without permission and ratification of the D.M.

 

There is undue intervention and pressure on them from the Ministry. Moreover, the exact nature of their work is not clear.

 

General problems of Anganwadi workers and helpers

 

Although there is no complaint of sexual harassment as such, and there are no complaint cells many women workers are used to allowing men to exploit them for the sake of getting favours and for increasing their clout. Other cases of violence do take place, for example in Sultanpur district of U.P., a primary school teacher stabbed a supervisor returning from election duty. He threatened to kill her even in the hospital. It was after a movement by the Uttar Pradesh Anganwadi Supervisors’ Association that she was saved and the teacher arrested. In another incident in Kanpur a CDPO forcibly stuffed ‘panjeeri’(roasted ata mixed with sugar) into the mouth of a Supervisor, saying ‘take, eat this’. Many such incidents of intimidation occur from time to time. Fear of humiliation, punishments and transfer make workers accept exploitation and corrupt activities, disrupting healthy work culture.

 

Women workers bear economic and other kinds of exploitation both at the workplace and at home, because often officials and family members have an eye on the honorarium of the workers.Trapped between family pressures and departmental pressures, the workers’ health suffers and they lack enthusiasm for fulfilling targets.

 

State Funding for the Scheme:

 

Prior to the financial year 2005-06 the Centre was providing 100 % financial assistance to all component services of the ICDS, except supplementary nutrition, which was taken care of by the States/UTs. But it was seen that states were not spending adequately, resulting in poor performance in reducing malnutrition. Therefore In 2005-06 it was decided that the Centre would share 50% of the expenditure in supplementary nutrition by the State.

 

But in 2009-10, the sharing pattern further changed. So the sharing between the Centre and North East Indian States was altered from 50:50 to 90:10. For all other states/UTs, including Uttar Pradesh, it was maintained at 50:50. However, as regards the other components the aid was reduced from 100% Central assistance to 90:10. The budgetary allocation for ICDS was slashed from Rs. 1800 crore in July 2014 budget to Rs.800 crore in the 2015 Union Budget while the budget for mid-day meals was decreased from Rs. 3000 crore to Rs. 1200 crores. The remaining expenses had to be managed by states/UTs.

 

In Ghoerni village of Shamli district of U.P., village elder Yogendra Kumar said, “Every single day, inedible khichdi is delivered to the three aanganwadi centres in our village. The intended beneficiaries are not aware of such a programme and those who know, find the food inedible. Ultimately, the khichdi is fed to the cattle every day.”

 

Infrastructure

 

The infrastructure is also not up to the mark. For example, the Central Government has also made population norms as follows for Anganwadi/Mini Anganwadi Centres in Rural and Urban Areas:

 

Serial No. Population Anganwadi Centre/Mini AWC
1. 400-800 1 AWC
2. 800-1600 2 AWCs
3. 1600-2400 3AWCs
4. Added Multiples of 800 1 AWC
5. 150-400 1 Mini AWC
Tribal, riverine, desert, hilly
and difficult areas
6. 300-800 1AWC
150-300 1 mini AWC

 

www.childlineindia.org.in › … › Child Targeted Schemes & Programmes

 

It is clear that the population norms, even if followed, are unscientific. Besides this, many of the AWCs are non-functional.

 

 

Why is the ICDS ridden with Problems ?

 

According to the National Family Health Survey the number of underweight children under three increased in Assam from 36% in 1998-99 to 40.4% in 2005-06, while the number of women with a bodymass index below normal rose from 27.1% to 36.5% during the same period. Anemia increased about 10% in both pregnant women and very young children from 1998-99 to 2005-06 to 72% and 76.7% respectively. In one of the few positive signs, stunting in children under three saw a decline from 50.2% to 34.8% during this time.1

 

In UP, malnutrition figures have not only persisted, but they have also been mired in controversies. In 2012, the state’s decision to award a Rs 10,000 crore contract for three years to Great Value Food, a company owned by slain industrialist Ponty Chadha, for supplying food for the Supplementary Nutrition Programme came under the scanner. The awarding of this contract had gone against the Supreme Court orders of 2004, which mandated that only self-help groups, Mahila Mandals, village communities and village-based industries could be awarded contracts for supplying food for the nutrition programme 9

 

The Central Government had sanctioned Rs. 569.96 crores for the construction of 14,938 Anganwadi Centres in the State of Orissa in 2010. But even by 2014, only 905 buildings had been constructed or identified for the same. Also, in Ranpur Block of Nayagarh District, 7 children eating mid-day meals in a dilapidated building died on 9 July 2012 due to the wall collapsing. This fact was cited in a PIL filed by RTI activist Pradip Pradhan10 filed in the Orissa High Court. The PIL sought direction for setting up of a State-level Monitoring Committee for utilization of Central Government funds for building Anganwadi Centres in the State. Meanwhile, the condition of the Workers is also not satisfactory.

 

It is clear that there is not only a lack of will but also large-scale corruption in the implementation of the scheme and no mechanism for monitoring it. Contractors are still looting the ICDS despite SC directive against contractual system.11

 

Condition of ICDS workers

 

Regularization

 

The Ministry of Women and Child Development has made it clear that the Government has no plans to regularise the ICDS Workers12. Even though some of them have worked for 40 long years

 

 Workers face wrath of Beneficiaries

 

The higher level officials are totally insensitive to the plight of both these workers and the beneficiaries, who are a neglected lot due to lack of infrastructure and staff. Often, it is the workers who have to face the wrath of the beneficiaries.

 

Lack of knowledge and Training

 

proper training is also not imparted to the Anganwadi workers and helpers who often do not understand the reasons behind malnutrition of women and children in the state

 

Corruption

 

Corruption at the level of officials is rampant. Appointments on forged certificates or through political pressure, bribery, misuse of funds, false records, pilfering of food material are some of them.

 

 Overwork and Multi-tasking

 

The employees have to multiple tasks and  are  overworked.

 

There is a lack of infrastructure, staff and transport facilities. Consequently, they are unable to meet targets or complete their within the stipulated time.

 

No Promotion

  • Whereas there are several vacant posts, workers are denied promotion.
  • ICDS guidelines are not followed and the scheme is bogged down with bureaucratic pressures combined with official apathy.
  • lack of decision making power in the hands of the employees,
  • There is no recognition of good work or any cadre review. The District Programme Officers (DPOs), who are appointed through the Public Service Commission, retire in the same posts in which they had been initially appointed. Their frustration, then, finds expression in their rough and inhuman behaviour with subordinate workers.
  • Child Development Programme Officers (CDPOs) and the Anganwadi Supervisors are in a similar situation. Some have been working in the same post for almost 30 years and there is no scope for promotion

 

Honorarium

 

The honorarium of CDPOs, Anganwadi Supervisors, Workers and helpers is not only very low, but is different for different states, the highest being Rs. 19,480 for workers and 13,330 for helpers in Pondicherry13. Many times the salary is delayed for months.

 

The DPOs, CDPOs, Supervisors, Workers and Helpers are never made aware of the changes being made in the ICDS, nor are they informed about new schemes; their participation is not elicited in the decision making, especially regarding the changes being incorporated in the ICDS.

 

Although the ICDS is under the Department of Women and Child, there is absolutely no consideration for women workers; no officials listen to the specific problems they face as women, during work. So the women workers know that there will be no solutions. This creates some kind of despondency in them.

 

According to Government norms, all employees of the ICDS should be females, since the work is related to women and children. But, since 1998-99, recruitment of male officials (CDPOs and DPOs) has been allowed in the state. Pregnant and lactating mothers and adolescent girls do not feel free to discuss their problems with them; hence it becomes difficult to get a clear picture of the problems faced by them. Even the Anganwadi workers are shy of discussing many problems with them.

 

Officers and family members discourage Union activities and create fear of retrenchment, so workers do not want to join the Association, though they want their problems to be resolved At the policy level, workers are against the Mission Plan, handing over to NGOs and local bodies, PPP, adoption by Corporates and drastic cut in the Budget for ICDS (18,108 in 2014-15) crores to 8,245.77 crores in 2015-16.14

 

  1. Schools for small children-primary level
  2. 10.(www.nhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balwadi)
  3.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midday_Meal_Scheme
  4. icds.gov.in
  5. http://www.indianpediatrics.net/mar2007/mar-169-171.htm
  6. http://www.deccanherald.com/content/141057/condition-adolescents-india-among-worst.html
  7. https://india.gov.in/rajiv-gandhi-scheme-empowerment-adolescent-girls-sabla
  8. (http://www.sccommissioners.org/Reports/Reports/ICDSReport_0706.pdf).
  9. (www.business-standard.com/…/rs-9-600-crore-needed-for-universalisatio
  10. http://inbministry.blogspot.in/2013/02/anganwadi-centres-awcsstrengthening-
  11. and.htmlutritionrights.org/News/showNews.aspx?qs..)
  12. (http://archives.scroll.in/article/677463/defying-supreme-court-ruling-private-contractors-still-feed-gujarats-anganwadis);
  13. http://www.telegraphindia.com/1140313/jsp/odisha/story_18072788.jsp#.V8wGT49OLmI; http://www.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/files/file/supreme%20court%20commissioners%2 0report%20on%20icds.pdf
  14. www.aifawh.org/
  15. http://www.mid-day.com/articles/cant-survive-on-rs-4000-a-month-aanganwadi-teachers/15015037
  16. http://peoplesdemocracy.in/2015/1115_pd/national-convention-anganwadi-workers-calls-march-parliament-feb-2016-%E2%80%98save-icds%E2%80%99

 

you can view video on Women & Violence in Kashmir