more-in Ramanathapuram The more than 1,400 anganwadis in the district were given facelift and the exterior areas wore clean look as the district administration has launched ‘Poshan Abhiyan’, India’s flagship programme to improve nutritional outcomes of children, pregnant women, lactating mothers and adolescent girls. Acting on the instructions of Collector K. Veera Raghava Rao, the officials had launched a mass cleaning – interior and exterior of all the 1,454 anganwadis in the district on Friday and completed the task on Saturday. A whole lot of panchayat staff, sanitary workers and ‘thooimai kavalargal’ (cleanliness guards) under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme were involved in the mass cleaning, said A. Chelladurai, Assistant Director, Panchayats. Most of these anganwadis wore a fresh look on Saturday and the anganwadi workers opened the centres on Saturday after sprinkling water and drawing ‘kolam’ on the front yards. As the Collector accorded priority for cleanliness and made it clear that cleanliness should be the first step for achieving nutritional improvement, the workers in the anganwadis, which catered to children and pregnant women had been asked to maintain cleanliness both inside and outside, he said. Mr. Rao, who had ensured ‘litter and plastic-free Collectorate complex’ soon after assuming office last month, gave 10 days time to the Department of panchayats and the local bodies to clean up all the 1,313 government schools, government hospitals and primary health centres, Mr Chelladurai said. The mass cleaning would begin on Monday and all the schools would be made ‘litter and plastic-free premises’, he said. Meanwhile, Mr. Rao had rolled out the month-long Poshan Abhiyan (National Nutrition Mission) programme with targeted approach and convergence strives to reduce the level of stunning, under nutrition, anemia and lowbirth weight in children. The programme also aimed at focusing on adolescent girls, pregnant women and lactating mothers to holistically address malnutrition. Officials said the anganwadis catered to 68,037 children and the Poshan Abhiyan would also cover 7,537 pregnant women and 6,241 lactating mothers in the district, they said.

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