The steep costs of malnutrition

Most children in Palghar’s Mokhada taluka eat only one meal at home, if any at all. Their only other meal comes from anganwadi centres. (Photo: Debashish Dey)

With a grant of just Rs 25 a day, anganwadi workers and women’s self help groups who supply food to anganwadi centres in Palghar are forced to dish out low-quality food lacking in the essential nutrients that can curb the spate of malnutrition deaths that have taken place in the district. According to a women’s group called Deepali Bachat Gat, it is impossible to match this Rs 25 grant with food of the standard that the state expects. Thus, they and the anganwadi workers concerned are now demanding that Rs 50 be given to them so that the quality of the food they serve can be improved.

When The Asian Age team visited Palghar, it found that the children and their mothers do not get nutritious food according to norms. Mangala Wagh, an anganwadi helper who has been supplying food to children for the past 11 years, cooks the food in her own home, a two-room hut in Kalamwadi village in Palghar’s Mokhada taluka. She said that the Rs 25 per plate she gets as grant from the government is not sufficient. “We have to provide eggs, dal, rice and chapatti if we are to give the children a nutritious meal once a day. But I have to spend Rs 6 on one egg and the remaining on other items such as rice and wheat. So tell me, is it possible to provide all these items for Rs 25 ” she asked.

At present, there are 39 beneficiaries at Ms Wagh’s anganwadi, including children between the ages of 4 months and six years and pregnant and lactating mothers.

The chief of Deepali Bachat Gat, Rakhi Hiraman Patil, also had several complaints regarding the hassles involved in running the organisation, such as not receiving food grains on time. “We often have to pay from our own pockets to buy rice and wheat from open markets, which the state reimburses only later,” Ms Rakhi said.

There is a public distribution shop in front of Ms Patil’s home, but it was closed at the time of this team’s visit. When asked whether they receive grains from this shop, Gangadhar, Ms Rakhi’s son, said they receive 25 kg of rice at Rs 3 per kilo and 10 kg of wheat at Rs 2 per kilo under the food security scheme. “We are educated and hence aware of our rights. So, the ration shopkeeper can’t cheat us,” he said.

However, it’s a different story for Ms Wagh at her anganwadi centre. She said, “We hardly get any food grains since when we ask the shopkeeper for it, he replies almost every time that the grains are either not available or the state is delaying sending them.”

Prashant Rukari, the headmaster of a private secondary school in Mokhada’s Khoch village, said: “Two things are necessary to change the condition of the tribal people here – food twice a day, and education. The government provides food only once a day at the anganwadi centres. In the evening, most of the tribal families sleep eating rice only or nothing at all. This has taken the deterioration of their health to serious levels.”

Meanwhile, Ms Wagh added that she gets Rs 3,250 per month as remuneration from the women and child development department to take care of her anganwadi centre. “Earlier, we received only Rs 500 per month. We have been fighting against the state for the past 10 years for an increment in the remuneration, which has now reached Rs 3,250,” she said.