Govt to provide Rs 6000 to pregnant & lactating women

To ensure pregnant and lactating mothers attains optimal nutritional status, Government will provide cash incentive of Rs 6000 for the wage loss so that the woman can take adequate rest before and after delivery and also to improve her health and nutrition during the period.
The Ministry of Women and Child Development, in accordance with the provisions of Section 4(b) of National Food Security Act, formulated a scheme for pregnant and lactating mothers called Maternity Benefit Programme - a conditional cash transfer scheme.
"The Scheme provides cash incentives to pregnant and lactating women for the wage loss so that they can take adequate rest before and after delivery; to improve her health and nutrition during the period of pregnancy and lactation and to breastfeed the child during the first six months of the birth, which is very vital for the development of the child," said a statement issued by WCD.

Under the scheme, all pregnant women and lactating mothers excluding the those who are in regular employment with the Central Government or State Governments or public sector undertakings, are eligible.
The cash incentive of Rs 6,000 will be paid in three instalments for the first two live births at the stages of early registration of pregnancy, at the time of institutional delivery and 3 months after delivery if the child birth is registered, child has received BCG vaccination and has received OPV and DPT-1 & 2.
The cash transfer would be Aadhaar linked through the individual bank or post office account in DBT mode.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his address to the nation on December 31 had announced pan-India expansion of MBP in all the districts with effect from January 1.

It is expected that annually about 51.70 lakh beneficiaries would avail of the benefit.
"Expansion of MBP will have huge impact on pregnant women and lactating mothers as it will not only provide them compensation for the wage loss but will also provide them adequate nutrition and rest before and after delivery.
"Mothers will have sufficient time to breastfeed the child during first six months of the birth. Resultantly, it is expected that it will reduce mother mortality rate, IMR, under-nutrition and its adverse effects," the statement said.

It is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme and the cost sharing between Centre and States is 60:40 for all the States and UTs (with legislature), 90:10 for NER and Himalayan States and 100 per cent GoI share for UTs without legislatures.
The total cost of the proposal for the balance period of 2016-17 and from 2017-18 to 2019-20 including Centre and State share is expected to be Rs 12,661.00 crore.