Kolkata, March 10 -- The state Women & Child Development and Social Welfare department is transitioning to LPG as cooking fuel in all Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) across the state in a significant stride towards improvement in the infrastructure of these centres.

According to a senior department official, 81,321 AWCs have been selected for the conversion to LPG with an amount of over Rs 40.31 crore being released for the financial year 2023-24. Presently, earthen chullahs or stoves are used for cooking in AWCs.

"We have also undertaken relocation of the AWCs that are in rented buildings or in unstable community buildings to government school premises. With the support of the state School Education department, we have created a database of schools with a separate room available for the move. Each school was inspected by block officials to ascertain the feasibility of creating an Anganwadi centre in the space available and from December 2022 to October 2023, 3,056 centres have moved to school premises," a senior official of the department said.

An additional 634 Anganwadi centres moved from temporary premises to government owned buildings in 2023-24. 4548 toilets and 175 drinking water facilities have been added to existing AWC infrastructure during the year. In response to grievances lodged at Paray Samadhan outreach programme of the state government, renovation and repair have been taken up in 3136 AWCs involving a fund of Rs 17.139 crore.

Under the Anganwadi Services scheme during the financial year 2023-24 , about 69.11 lakh children below 6 years of age and 12.29 lakh pregnant and lactating mothers receive supplementary nutrition in the form of hot cooked meals for 26 days each month regularly.

The scheme has improved nutrition status of children, with only 3.98 per cent children below 5 years found underweight in 2023-24 as against 5.1 per cent of children in 2022-23.

66,126 Shishu Aloy (AWCs providing quality early childhood care and education) are operational across the state.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.