Mangalore, Apr 26 (DHNS): It is an irony that children who are dependent on anganwadi centres in rural and urban areas are deprived of basic facilities including electricity, toilet facility and potable water.
Dakshina Kannada district has a total of 2,102 anganwadi centres including 20 mini anganwadi centres, of which, only 252 anganwadi centres have electricity connections and the remaining 1,850 anganwadi centres do not have electricity connections.
Mangalore urban has 228 anganwadi centres, of which, only 38 have electricity connections. In Mangalore rural, 330 anganwadi centres do not have electricity. The total number of centres in Mangalore rural is 448. Bantwal taluk has highest number of anganwadi centres in Dakshina Kannada district. There are 570 centres in the taluk alone, of which, 537 centres do not have electricity connections.
Belthangady taluk has 321 anganwadi centres, of which, only 25 have electricity facility. Of the 370 anganwadi centres in Puttur taluk, 338 centres do not have power connections. Sullia has 165 anganwadi centres. However, only six centres have electricity connections.
Similarly, kids in 1,636 anganwadi centres have the privilege of using toilets for attending the nature’s call. The remaining 446 anganwadi centres are yet to get the toilet facility.
About 530 anganwadi centres are still functioning in rented buildings. The kids of 550 anganwadi centres still do not get potable drinking water as there is no water connections to the centres.
Though Dakshina Kannada district has won Nairmalya Purskar from the Central government, there are 466 anganwadi centres which do not have toilet facilities in the district.
According to a recently released survey report on status of education—‘Shaikshanika praja varadi,’ in Dakshina Kannada prepared by Prajayatna, a NGO working in education field said, “several anganwadi centres in Dakshina Kannada district do not have compound walls and lack basic infrastructure facilities.
The anganwadi centres must be provided with building, potable water, toilet and cooking gas facilities. The local government should make an attempt to supply play materials for the kids attending the anganwadi centres in their vicinity. There is a need to motivate Balavikasa samithi and Women Self Help Groups in this regard.”
Speaking to Deccan Herald, Zilla Panchayat CEO Dr K N Vijyaprakash said that the work on electricity connection to anganwadi centres in Dakshina Kannada will be given priority.
The list has already been prepared and talks have been held with the executive engineers of Mescom. The work on electricity connection to anganwadi centres will be taken up under Rajiv Gandhi Rural Electrification project.
“Once the electricity connection is provided to all the anganwadi centres in Dakshina Kannada, then DK will be first district in the state to have all the anganwadi centres electrified.”
All that anganwdi centre require is a tubelight and a fan. As majority of the anganwadi centres are made of sheets, the children find it difficult to sit inside the room during peak summer, said an anganwadi teacher.