GS-2: Welfare Schemes for Vulnerable Sections of the population by the Centre and States and the Performance of these Schemes

Key phrases - Beti Bachao Beti Padhao,

Why in news

Government data indicates paltry utilization of funds for BBBP scheme

Analysis:

What is BBBP?

• BBBP is a national campaign and focussed multi-sectoral action in 100 selected districts low in Child Sex Ratio (CSR), covering all States and UTs.
• This is a joint initiative of the Ministry of Women and Child Development, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Human Resource Development.
• Objective is prevention of gender-biased sex-selective elimination.
• Ensuring survival & protection of the girl child.

Key elements of Scheme

• Creating awareness among the people about the education and importance of girl children
• Taking all communities into consideration and teaching them about the scheme. It implements the scheme on a larger scale.
• Providing information about the benefits of having a girl child so that people can see them equally. Simply making them unbiased towards the girl child.
• Enforcing the PC (Preconception) and PNDT (Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques) Acts which prohibit the diagnostics used to check the gender of the fetus.
• To promote Institutional deliveries for safe deliveries of pregnant mothers.

Why was the Scheme needed?

• In the 2001 census, there were 927 girls per 1000 boys but it declined to 919 girls per 1000 boys in 2011.
• States like Haryana has the lowest sex ratio i.e. 834 per 1000 males.
• Social construct discriminating girls on the one hand, easy availability, affordability and subsequent misuse of diagnostic tools on the other hand, have been critical in declining CSR. The strong socio-cultural and religious biases, preference for sons.
• Global Gender Gap Index, 2021 revealed that India ranks 140th of 156 countries, compared to its 98th position in 2006.
• India’s FLFPR (24.5% in 2018-19) has also been declining and is well below the global average of 45%.
• Occupational segregation and limited opportunities to enter non-traditional sectors.
• Crimes against women and girls (CaW&G), it is arguably the most prevalent barrier to women’s equal participation in and contribution to society. while the all-India FLFPR saw an 8 percentage-point decline, the rate of CaW&G more than tripled to 57.9% between 2011-17.

Performance of Scheme

• Sex Ratio at Birth (SRB) has improved by 16 points from 918 (2014-15) to 934 (2019-20), as per the Health Management Information System (HMIS) data. Mau (Uttar Pradesh) from 694 (2014-15) to 951 (2019-20).
• Percentage of 1st Trimester ANC (Ante-Natal Care) Registration has shown an improving trend from 61% in 2014-15 to 71% in 2019-20.
• Institutional Deliveries: Percentage of Institutional Deliveries has shown an improving trend from 87% in 2014-15 to 94% in 2019-20.
• GER of girls in the schools at secondary level has improved from 77.45 (2014-15) to 81.32 (2018-19) as per Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE) provisional data.
• Percentage of schools with functional separate toilets for girls has shown improvement from 92.1% in 2014-15 to 95.1% in 2018-19.
• BBBP scheme has been able to bring the focus on important issue of female infanticide, lack of education amongst girls and deprivation of their rights on a life cycle continuum.
• People are using the BBBP logo on their own at various places such as school buses, buildings, and popular festivals to affirm their commitment to the cause.
• Frontline government employees have been successfully collaborating at the local level for observing the son-centric rituals and also observed celebrating the birth of a girl child i.e. Kuwapoojan, Thali Bajana, etc.
• Mothers and girl children are being hailed by the local administration to establish the relevance of the girl child. Beti Janmotsav is one of the key programmes celebrated in each district.

Issues with the Scheme

• Government informed in parliament that only 23% of funds allotted for scheme were spent by states.
• Out of funds utilized 80% were used for media outreach only.
• While scheme worked on attitudinal changes the violence against women increased during pandemic as reported by UN commission for women.
• Scheme didn’t take care of ground realities like female dropout rate, poor female labour force participation which is among worst in developing countries.
• There was no emphasis on educating women on their reproductive and sexual health. Menstruation woes still remain a taboo and institutional deliver is still not a norm.
• Malnutrition in India is at levels of sub Saharan Africa as per world huge report. Girls face biggest brunt of this and discontinuation of mid-day meal due to Covid has further exacerbated it.

Why schemes are poorly implemented in India?

• Unequal distribution of land and assets benefits are mooched by non-poor.
• Implementation depends upon government officials and they are usually ill motivated, inadequately trained, corruption-prone. Wage employment is an example to show how too much of administrative interference has led to underutilization of funds.
• Non-participation of local level institutions in programme implementation-SHGS micro credit programme is one example of participatory success.
• Need to co-ordinate a myriad of programmes of the central government and the State governments. The transfer of central funds to the States for different programmes should be efficient.
• Inefficiency in poorer and badly performing States is due to lack of motivation, accountability, absence of performance appraisal, absence of a system of incentives and penalties, understaffing and poor working conditions on the one hand, and large-scale leakages on the other.
• Incomplete works that go on for a long time due to inadequate resource allocation breed cynicism, and a loss of faith in the ability of the Government to deliver.
• Overloading of work occurs when screening mechanisms are weak, and this implies that the top decision-makers are unable to set or enforce sectoral ceilings and priorities. When an overloaded plan comes up against the real constraints of State finances, the result is inevitable

Way ahead

• Close monitoring can be organised in selected areas such as implementation of schemes relating to primary health, primary education, watershed development, empowerment of the local people to discharge their responsibilities effectively at the local level.
• Governance reform thus needs to be at the center-stage of development planning, since without good governance and programme implementation, much of the vast quantum of resources being spent on development is wasted
• In view of the large number of such works and schemes that may exist, it would be necessary to develop a simple transparent criterion for their prioritisation in order to enable the most productive use of resources.
• The policies are made in ministries but implemented at state, district and village level and the administrator may not know about every scheme implemented in his/her district. Removing the small schemes to better focus on larger schemes can improve the administrators in executing.
• Schemes can be tailor made as per the local conditions. Some states like Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Gujarat and to some extent Maharashtra have been successful in implementing healthcare schemes but other states like Bihar, Orissa and other states not.
• There is a need for better coordination among centre and state governments and may be customized policies may work better than homogenous ones in some states.
• There is a need for better coordination among private entities, community, civil society, NGOs and government in designing a public policy in order to improve the transparency, quality and effectiveness of a policy or scheme.

Source:The Hindu

Mains Question:

Q. The violence against females, in many cases, starts even before they are born. Outline the chronological order of violence faced by a woman in her life time. Also, recommend transformative measures to address this issue. (15 Marks, 250 Words)