ICDS Scheme

The Union Minister of Women and Child Development, Maneka Sanjay Gandhi, informed the Rajya Sabha on Thursday that as per National Family Health Survey (NFHS) -3, 2005-06, the top five states, where the number of malnourished women is very high includes Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Orissa.

In this connection, she stated that the government is implementing several schemes like the ICDS Scheme, National Health Mission, Rajiv Gandhi Scheme for Empowerment of Adolescent Girls, Indira Gandhi Matritva Sahyog Yojna as direct targeted interventions.

Besides, the Centre is providing indirect multi-sectoral interventions through National Food Security Mission, Total Sanitation Campaign, National Rural Drinking Water Programme etc. All these schemes have potential to address one or other aspect related to nutrition including nutrition of women, she stated.

Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme is a centrally sponsored scheme providing a package of services comprising (i) Supplementary nutrition (ii) Pre-school non-formal education (iii) Nutrition and health Education (iv) Immunization (v) Health check-up and (vi) Referral services through Anganwadi Centres to children below 6 years of age and pregnant women& lactating mothers.

The later three services viz. Immunization, Health check-up and Referral services are provided in convergence with Public Health Systems of the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare. For nutritional purposes ICDS provides 300 kilocalories (with 8-10 grams of protein) every day to every child below 6 years of age.

For adolescent girls it is up to 500 kilo calories with up to 25 grams of protein every day. These services are provided from Anganwadi centres established mainly in rural areas and staffed with frontline workers.

By end of 2010, the programme is claiming to reach 80.6 lakh expectant and lactating mothers along with 3.93 crore children (under 6 years of age). There are 6,719 operational projects with 1,241,749 operational Aanganwadi centres. Several positive benefits of the programme have been documented and reported.

The budget allocation under the ICDS Scheme for the year 2014-15 was Rs 16,561 crore (as per revised estimates). For the current fiscal 2015-16, Rs 8,335.77 crore has been allocated for the scheme. However,the reduction in budgetary allocation is likely to be offset by expected higher cost share from States and demand for supplementary grants.