Ahmedabad district panchayat gets award

At a time when ‘malnutrition and Gujarat’ is a topic for debate even at the national level, the Ahmedabad District Panchayat has received an award for fighting malnutrition in rural areas.

The DL Shah Award for general services in government category was bestowed upon the panchayat by the Quality Council of India during its 8th National Quality Conclave held on March 8-9 in New Delhi.

The award was conferred upon the panchayat on the basis of coverage, innovativeness, reliability and sustainability. Interestingly, QCI had invited nominations in December 2012, even as the malnutrition issue was raised by political parties during the campaign for assembly elections.

Initiated in September 2011, the panchayat’s drive covered 1,44,772 children in the age group of 0 to 6 years. According to district development officer Banchhanidhi Pani, there were 4,626 severely malnourished children in the district in September 2011, which had come down to 2,312. Similarly, the number of moderately malnourished children had dropped to 30,285 from 46,348 during the same period. 

Pani said that the panchayat introduced customised electronic baby weighing machines and made it available at 310 anganwadi centres in the district. A malnutrition tracking website (Matra) for preparing childwise data and assessment of the project was also set up, he added.

Congress MLA from Viramgam constituency had raised the question of malnutrition in the district a few days ago.