A Correspondent
DHUBRI: Dhubri district topped the list of Poshan Maah activities in the State in its first week from September 1 to September 7 while Darang was placed distant second. In Dhubri district, as many as 19 activities under the Poshan Maah were conducted in 13 out of 14 Children Development Blocks wherein 3,898 people (1,282 male and 2,616 female) participated with 2,483 children from 0-6 years of age. Darang was placed distant second. In Darang district, 30 activities were conducted in the six blocks wherein 1,096 people participated with 612 children while Nalbari district placed down the list with not a single activity conducted in the first week of Poshan Maah.
In Dhubri district, awareness programmes were conducted on various themes which included right nutrition to the children, growth monitoring, early marriage, anaemia, teenage pregnancy, food fortification, hand wash, hygiene, pregnant women caring, breastfeeding, micro-nutrients, diarrhoea, safe drinking water, sanitation, adolescence and antenatal care.
In the first week, Dhubri district was leading in awareness campaign and it seems that with growing participation, Poshan Abhiyan is slowly transforming into a Jana Andolan. Arpita Saha of Swasth Bharat Prerak informed The Sentinel that they were able to set up breastfeeding and hand wash corners in a large number of Anganwadi centres.
“In the coming weeks, we will launch initiative to combat malnutrition by addressing teenage pregnancy in this region,” Saha informed. On the other hand, Biswajit Patra of Piramal Foundation (NITI ADT-Project) informed that the campaign was on the right track and they were implementing Poshan Maah themes by actively supporting ICDS activities through the BTOs (Block Transformation Officers) engaged under Piramal Foundation.
“We are addressing core issues of Poshan Maah in the cluster meetings with Anganwadi workers. We hope this campaign will take the form of Jana Andolan (people’s movement) in the days to come because participants are growing with each passing day,” he said. In addition to this, Dhubri district NHM Community Mobilizer Arif Ahmed said activities were being carried out by frontline ASHAs, ANMs and ICDS supervisors.
“Beside vigorous campaigns on breastfeeding, we also conducted National Deforming Day on August 10, provided biannual Albadazole dose on August 17, conducted meeting of Village Health, Sanitation and Nutrition Committee (VHSNC), maintained baby growth chart, distributed Iron-folic Acid (IFA) tablets and conducted meeting of MAA (Mother Absolute Affection),” Ahmed further said.