Children and Anganwadi workers being enrolled for Aadhar for provision of services under ICDS: Maneka Gandhi

The Aadhaar Act, 2016 has been notified in the Gazette of India vide notification dated 26.03.2016 conferring legal status upon the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to issue Aadhaar to the residents of India. Under the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme, Aadhaar enrolment of children below 5 years has been taken up with States/Union Territories. As per information available from UIDAI, Aadhaar saturation among children below 5 years of age is 32.3% as on 30.11.2016.

States/ UTs have been requested to organise special enrolment camps at Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) for enrolment of children below 5 years under Aadhaar.

Further, following child development schemes of Ministry of Women and Child Development have been identified for inclusion under Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) platform by linking them to Aadhaar:

(i) Integrated Child Development Services - Honorarium to Anganwadi Workers and Anganwadi Helpers;

(ii) Rajiv Gandhi National Creche Scheme for Children- Honorarium to Workers.

Implementation of the proposal depends on Aadhaar enrolment of children below 5 years.

The Ministry of Women and Child Development is administering Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme which provides a package of six services i.e. (i) Supplementary Nutrition; (ii) Pre-school Non-formal Education; (iii) Nutrition and Health Education; (iv) Immunization; (v) Health Check-up; and (vi) Referral Services to children (below 6 years of age) and pregnant & lactating mothers (P&L) at the platform of Anganwadi Centres across the country. Three of the above six services viz. immunization, health check up and referral services are related to heath and are provided through Public Health Infrastructure.

The scheme today operates through a network of 7073 fully operational Projects and 13.49 lakh Anganwadi Centres as on 30.09.2016. The services are currently being provided to 1010.56 lakh beneficiaries of which 820.65 lakh are children under six years of age and 189.91 lakh are P&L Mothers. 345.44 lakh children of 3-6 years are provided pre-school education.