Over 2 L smartphones, tablets procured by 8 states for anganwadis: Official data

Over 2 lakh smartphones and tablets have been procured by eight states to aid anganwadis in monitoring nutrition levels in children, according to an official data.

The smartphones and tablets have been procured under the 'Poshan Abhiyan', a programme launched with the aim to reduce the level of stunting, undernutrition, anemia and low birth weight in children.

It aims to achieve reduction in stunting from 38.4 per cent (NFHS-4) to 25 per cent by 2022.

The smartphones and tablets would have the 'Integrated Child Development Services-Common Application', that could be used for drawing nutrition profile of each village.

The system would get real-time reports from the grassroots level.

The application has been made available offline partially so that the anganwadis could note information about child nutrition in the app from even the remote parts of the country where internet connectivity is poor or unavailable, Secretary at the Women and Child Development Ministry, Rakesh Srivastava, said.

The information recorded by the anganwadis would be shared with the supervisor, who will then feed it into the database server.

The database could be accessed by various stakeholders at every level, including the ministry officials.

By monitoring the nutrition level, the app indicates whether a child is malnourished or underweight, depending on which suitable action are taken. The app also keeps a track of pregnant or lactating mothers and depending on their status, necessary steps are initiated, Srivastava said.

About 2,03,115 smartphones have been procured by Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Puducherry, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh and Union Territory Dadar and Nagar Haveli.

However, the requirement of smartphones for the anganwadis in these eight states are nearly 6 lakh.

The requirement of smartphones and tablets throughout the country is 11 lakh.

All 36 states and union territories, and 718 districts would be covered in a phased manner by the year 2020, a senior Women and Child Development official had said, adding that 9.2 million children and 1.2 million pregnant women and lactating mothers have been benefited by it till now.