Investing In Young Children and Prosperity Internship... · 2017-01-23 · Investing In Young Children and Prosperity . Report on ICDS for improving the delivery system of services

Investing In Young Children and Prosperity Report on ICDS for improving the delivery system of services

3/8/2012

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Report Submitted by:

Nikhil Kumar PGD- GBO (Batch 2011-13) Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University Email: [email protected]

Investing In Young Children and Prosperity

Nikhil Kumar(SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13)

Contents

(i) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ………………………………………………….page i (ii) Acronyms and Equivalencies……………………………………………. Page vi (iii) ACKNOWLEDGEMENT…………………………..………………………..page 1

Chapter 1

(iv) An Introduction to ICDS operations in Bihar…… ………………..page 2

Chapter 2

Overview

(v) Objective………………………………………………………………………....page 3 (vi) Benefits………………………………………………………………………….…page 3 (vii) Methodology for Selecting the Evidence…………………………...page 4

Findings & recommendations

(viii) Observation 1- ………………………………………………………….…. Page 5 (ix) Observation 2- …………………………………………………….………. Page7 (x) Observation 3 …………………………………………………..…………. Page 9 (xi) Observation 4- ………………………………………………….…………. Page 11 (xii) Observation 5- …………………………………………………….………. Page 13 (xiii) Observation 6- ……………………………………………….……………. Page 15 (xiv) Observation 7- …………………………………………….………………. Page 16 (xv) Observation 8- …………………………………………….………………. Page 18 (xvi) Conclusion …………………………………………………………..…………… page 19


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page I

Executive Summary

India is home to the largest number of children in the world. Nearly every fifth child in the World lives in India. There are about 16 crore children in the age group of 0-6 years, out of which 11.5 % are from Bihar. Bihar is the 12th largest state in terms of geographical size at 98,940 km2 and 3rd largest by population. Almost 58% of population are below the age of 25, which is the highest proportion in India and it has been termed as the country's fastest growing state followed by Delhi and Pondicherry for the year 2011–12. Bihar has reported a growth of 13.1% for the year 2011–12 while it was 14.8% for the previous year. However 81.4 % of its population is said to fall under “POOR” category according to a UN survey (2010) measuring health & nutrition, education and standard of living. There has always been a strong need for ensuring proper early childhood development progeam, that’s were Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) comes in. The demographic of Bihar child population can be understood as:

Figure 1 - 2011 census data for Bihar

With strong government commitment and political will, Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program has emerged from small beginnings in 1975 to become India’s flagship nutrition program and one of the world’s most unique programs. ICDS under the Department of Social Welfare (GOI) has been gradually expanded to 6284 projects. The current number of running projects in Bihar has grown to 545 of which there are 91677 Sanctioned AWCs spread over in 534 blocks. ICDS is well-conceived and well-placed to address the major causes of child under nutrition in Bihar. However, more attention has been given to increasing coverage than to improving the quality of service delivery and to distributing food rather than changing family-based feeding and caring behavior.

Approximate Population 10.38 Crore

Total Child Population (0-6 Age) 18,582,229

Child Sex Ratio 933

Approx. No. of Children Born per Year 2,481,655

Approx. No. of Children who Die Before They are 1 153,863

Approx. No. of Underweight Children Under the Age 3 3,903,708


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page II

Today it offers a wide range of health, nutrition and education services to children, women and adolescent girls. However, while the program is intended to target the needs of the poorest and the most undernourished, as well as the age groups that represents a significant “window of opportunity”. There is a mismatch between the program’s intentions and its actual implementation. This has resulted in limited impact. The program faces substantial operational challenges. Inadequate worker skills, shortage of infrastructure, poor supervision detract from the program’s potential impact. Community workers (AWW) are overburdened, because they are expected to provide preschool education to four to six year olds as well as nutrition services to all children under six, with the consequence that most children under 3—the group that suffers most from malnutrition—do not get micronutrient supplements, and most of their parents are not reached with counseling on better feeding and child care practices.

Objective of the Study

To address the mismatch between intensions and implementation, ICDS Bihar under the DFID supported SWASTH Program launched an internship scheme for young graduate (masters/doctoral degree) students from leading universities across the world with relevant specialization to work with it. The basic idea of this program was to help ICDS know better the bottlenecks, generate ideas and research, find new and innovative solution, and also to overcome many of the challenges being faced by ICDS program in general as its implementation in Bihar in particular. The proposed internship report will set to bring more involvement and trust of the population. The system will tend to become more transparent and its delivery system will have higher reach and will provide support to all other systems (i.e., in case of disaster and outbreaks)

Methodology for Selecting the Evidence

The mode of work was a detailed study and extracting questionnaire for the staff and beneficiaries. Their problems with existing services and amalgamation were considered during interviews. Funding’s constrains and patters were discussed. The focus was to gain from their experience and to discuss my proposed ideas and model for ICDS. Visiting AMC and interviewing AWW, LS, CDPO’s, DPO’s and beneficiaries of the allocated district was my priority. Following this, I visited 17 blocks and interviewed 14 CDPO’s and 2 DPO’s and many frontend workers of the service. I also paid attention on working of the offices of CDPO’s and DPO’s. I also took part in workshops, procession, social audit camps to gain firsthand knowledge of the activities of the services. All the data used in this report are collected from the centralized ICDS MPR portal. Models were suggested for displaying a clear picture of my recommendations.


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page III

Major Findings:

1. The existing MIS fails provide the kind of information needed to take managerial decisions and tools of convenience to analyze data. It’s just been treated as a numerical jargon by the officials. The main data center has no data worker to utilize data for extracting information from it. The Existing MIS system does have Decision support system and Smart report generation tool for the convenience of the officers and decision takers. MPR doesn’t really show the progress but a numerical status which is of no use without comparative analysis.

2. Monitoring system has been highly stressed and talked upon but many bottlenecks still exists. SNP has become a big issue in monitoring and has been subjected to a lot of controversies and irregularities. As a result all unnecessary focus is given to the SNP other than providing complete package of services for early childhood development. AWW too dedicate their major time to SNP. I would thus say that ICDS is now only being treated just as a “Nutrition Program”.

3. The hierarchical architecture at district level doesn’t ensure proper work cohesion between CDPO’s and DPO. The relationship between the CDPO’s and DPO are strained. The hierarchical order of working was ignored. The DM played an important role in district administration as his higher involvement is sought for timely and successful implementation of services. At the same time his active involvement may hamper the order of authority by often bypassing DPO and directly handling CDPO’S and making them to report directly to his office. So CDPO’s don’t feel the answerability to the DPO. They lack sense of trust among each other.

4. There are no provisions to encourage and motivate community workers (AWW). Encouraging the frontend workers to perform more and motivating them not to adopt unethical practices, a Reward and Recognition culture of frontend workers is much needed. The current system doesn’t allow AWW to help improve but only to punish.

5. There is a need to increase the public participation in the AWC, and opportunity to take advantage of this social movement of building a healthy and developed society. The AWC is struggling and fails to achieve its goals due to low community participation and ignorance. The current environment has lots of irregularities and transparency has not been achieved despite many attempts. AWC fails to get the type of recognition, trust it deserves. It is unable to guide and mentor its population due to inefficient AWW, who mostly lack leadership and motivational qualities and are unable to handle the responsibilities due to huge workload or improper training.


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page IV

Major Recommendations:

1. The MIS should be equipped with advance interactive report generation functionality which may help the officials to compare and study report in convenient and lucid manner. The format of MPR should be graphical representation with several new indicators comparing with other equivalent services or with other service areas. MIS has to be equipped with smart Rule validations techniques, so the data operator may make fewer mistakes and redundancy/validity of data could be avoided or detected. Equipping MIS with Decision support system (DSS), data sharing provisions and data perdition alarm system will help the planning and decision board to take action on real time basis. Understanding your data is an import need to gain knowledge from it.

2. AS to insure complete package of services to the beneficiaries and better supervision and control, the SNP distribution should be made centralized. The time saved by AWW in this provision will be focused to channelize efforts on other services. For this it is essential to draw a channel for regular distribution and monitoring. I recommend setting up of centralized advance kitchens for nearby blocks to cook and deliver meals for the AWC. A centralized kitchen would ensure quality food with proper cooking techniques and would help add variety to the menu chart. This would be done directly under the supervision CDPO’s and DPO of the concerned area. The daily deliveries are to be done in the presence of the concerned LS, which will ensure regular monitoring of AWC. Equipping LS with “DRISTI” project will further enhance the real time monitoring. This will also act as a distribution channel for supply and procurement of items at AWC.

3. The hierarchical architecture at district level doesn’t ensure proper work cohesion

between CDPO’s and DPO. DM higher involvement surely reduces the answerability of CDPO’s to DPO. To overcome this protocol of hierarchy should be respected and followed. DM should always root reports through DPO and his information flow channel should always be DPO. It should be the responsibility of the DM‘s office to always ensure proper work cohesion between CDPO’s and DPO. Provision of directly reporting to DM office should be removed from CDPO’s responsibility. To strengthen the office of DPO capacity building is must.


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page V

4. A “FAMOUS - INFAMOUS Recognition Culture “is recommended for encouraging the frontend workers. The recommendation model will cover both the performing and non-performing workers as well. Rewarding those workers whose performance is comparatively better than the average workers. Reward may include certification from District Magistrate or it could be in the form of some appreciation money. A Title of “FACE OF ICDS” is also recommended for reward which will have special provisions. The non-performing workers will have the provision to face silent public humiliation by “BLACK LIST Model”. This model will help them improve their working rather subjecting them to any penalty and finally termination of their service.

5. The AWW necessarily needs a lift up and its capacity building should be treated

with utmost priority. To prepare AWC for wider responsibilities in the society public participation should be encouraged for monitoring and guidance. To gain the respect and credibility among its population AWW should team up with JEEVIKA (Bihar Rural Livelihood Project) workers. They should share the common platform of Mahila Mandalas meetings so that it could attain self-sufficiency in addressing the overall needs of women. Other involvements that will strengthen its functioning may be lady school teachers and girls of the primary/middle schools of the village which have relevance to their functions. It would provide better counseling and guiding platform to the population.

Training the frontend workers about the services and delivery system will help them to understand ICDS better and training them on leadership qualities, motivation will help them enhance their capabilities .Disaster management will help them handle the situation of disease expression, flood or other natural calamities in a better way.


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page VI

Acronyms and Equivalencies

Acronyms ANM Auxiliary Nurse Midwife ASHA Accredited Social Health Activist AWC Anganwadi Centers AWH Anganwadi Helper AWW Anganwadi Worker BPL Below Poverty Line BRLP Bihar Rural Livelihood Project CHC Community Health Center CDPO Child Development Project Officer DPO District Programme Officer DTP Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis ECD Early Childhood Development ECE Early Childhood Education EPI Expanded Programme On Immunization GDP Gross Domestic Product ICDS Integrated Child Development Services IDD Iodine Deficiency Disorders JSY Janani Suraksha Yojana LBW Low Birth weight LS Lady Supervisor MCH Mother And Child Health MDG Millennium Development Goals MIS Management Information System MO Medical Officer MPR Monthly Progress Report MWCD Ministry Of Women And Child Development NGO Nongovernmental Organization NHED Nutrition And Health Education NFHS National Family Health Survey NIPCCD National Institute Of Public Cooperation And Child Development NRHM National Rural Health Mission PHC Primary Health Center SNP Special Nourishment Programme THR Take Home Ration UN United Nations UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund WHO World Health Organization Equivalencies 55 rupees (Rs) = 1 U.S. Dollar (US$) July 2012 rates 1 lakh = 1,00,000 10 lakhs = 1 million 1 crore = 100 lakhs = 10 million 100 crores = 1 billion = 1,000 million


Nikhil Kumar (SRCC, PGDGBO 11-13) Page 1

Acknowledgement

I take this opportunity to thank Mr. Praveen Kishore, Director ICDS and Miss Abha Prashad Monitoring officer, for there valuable guidance, closely supervising this work over the past two months and helpful suggestions. Their valuable advice and support, in spite of their busy schedule have really been an inspiration and driving force for me. They have constantly enriched my raw ideas with their experience and knowledge.

I am thankful to various dignitaries of the user agencies, DPOs, CDPOs and whole of the ICDS department of districts of NALANDA & JEHANABAD who helped and rendered their valuable time, knowledge and information and whose suggestions and guidance has enlightened on the subject. I thank them for extending all the help and cooperation during our internship period.

I owe sincere thanks to to Mr. Pradeep Joseph who helped often to enable me continue

my field visits properly.

Nikhil Kumar PGD in Global Business Operations (Batch 2011-13) Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University



1 | An Introduction to ICDS operations in Bihar

The Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme, launched on 2nd October, 1975 on an experimental basis in 33 ICDS blocks in accordance to the National Policy for Children, now under the supervision of the Department of Social Welfare (GOI) has been gradually expanded to 6284 projects. The current number of running projects in Bihar has grown to 545 of which there are 91677 Sanctioned AWCs spread over in 534 blocks.

ICDS is India’s response to the challenge of breaking a vicious cycle of malnutrition, impaired development, morbidity and mortality in young children. It responds to the inter related needs of children below 6 years, pregnant women, lactating mother and adolescent girls through providing a package of integrated services comprising Supplementary Nutrition, Immunization, Health Check-up, Referral Services, Nutrition and Health Education and Non-formal Education . In Bihar, the ICDS programme today reaches out to more than four million children under six years of age and around one million expectant and nursing mothers. Of these, nearly two million children (between the ages of three to six) also participate in center-based preschool education activities.

Due to the substantial shifts in focus and improvements in implementation of services by the state government the icds is slowly but surely moving to achieve its full potential. However many bottleneck still exists.



2| Overview

Objective

The ICDS has expanded tremendously over its 30 years of operation to cover almost all development Blocks in Bihar and offers a wide range of health, nutrition and education services to children, women and adolescent girls. However, while the program is intended to target the needs of the poorest and the most undernourished, as well as the age groups that represent a significant “window of opportunity” for nutrition investments (i.e. children under three, pregnant and lactating women), there is a mismatch between the program’s intentions and its actual implementation. To address this mismatch between intensions and implementation, ICDS Bihar under the DFID supported SWASTH Programme launched an internship scheme for young graduate (masters/doctoral degree) students from leading universities of the world with relevant specialization to work with it . The basic idea of this programme was to help icds know better the bottlenecks , generate ideas and research, find new and innovative solution, and also to overcome many of the challenges being faced by ICDS program in general as its implementation in Bihar in particular. The proposed internship report will set to bring more involvement and trust of the population. The system will tend to become more transparent and its delivery system will have higher reach and will provide support to all other systems (i.e., in case of disaster and outbreaks)

Benefits This internship was a challenging opportunity, as to work with India’s foremost ECD programme and understand its working in complex environments. However the benefits it provided for interns were:

• It gave opportunity to work with social and government organization at grass root level and gain practical experiences.

• Experience the feeling of giving better life to those, who cannot do it by themselves. • It gave a platform to harness management, leadership and team management skill

based on practical exposer and experiences. • Opportunity to interact directly with key personnel and frontend workers involved in the

services and gain access & understandability of various activities of the department. • It helped in assessing the quality of the latest Situation on each topic and identifying the

knowledge gaps for which additional evaluations were required. • Last but not the least, to get appreciation of my efforts in the form of certificates.



Methodology for Selecting the Evidence

The notes in this report contain references to the findings of my studies during my internship at ICDS. These studies were selected after an extensive research and brain storming. My work consisted of certain areas of interest . This included the following:

• Study to increase MIS Feasibility & Data Utilization • Capacity building of various offices and workers • Improving the delivery system ( health ,under nutrition, Distribution parameters) • Analysis of the existing work culture and group dynamics • Study to Focus on other services of ICDS apart from feeding • Study to analyze decentralization of management and to implement a flexible

architecture The mode of work was a detailed study and questionnaire for the staff and beneficiaries were extracted. Their problems with existing services and amalgamation were considered during interview. Funding’s constrains and patters were discussed. The focus was to gain from their experience and to discuss my proposed ideas and model for ICDS. Visiting AMC and interviewing AWW, LS, CDPO’s, DPO’s and beneficiaries of the allocated district was my priority. Following this, I visited 17 blocks and interviewed 14 CDPO’s and 2 DPO’s and many frontend workers of the service. I also paid attention on working of the offices of CDPO’s and DPO’s. I also took part in workshops, procession, social audit camps to gain firsthand knowledge of the activities of the services. Mode of Data collection All the data that were used in this report are collected from the centralized ICDS MPR portal

http://icdsbih.gov.in/ I was provided with all relevant data to support and guide my studies at ICDS. The data were analyzed for understanding the trends and extracting knowledge. The outcome of my study and questionnaire are documented in this report in the form of

OBSERVATION FINDINGS RECOMMENDATIONS

http://icdsbih.gov.in/



Observation | 1

The existing MIS fails to provide the kind of information needed to take managerial decisions and tools of convenience to analyze data.

• Findings MPR submitted by block offices fails to provide any analyzed or processed feedback to the report. The provision is missing as the officials fail to verify and understand the data. Its was my common finding that they lack determination and time to verify the authenticity of the data received and compiled by them. They lack tool and manpower to compare their own performance with the world and nations standards.

I believe that none of the mechanism was in place to extract knowledge or information from the MIS system. It’s just being treated as a numerical heap. Same is the case in the directorate office. The main data center has no data worker. The Existing MIS system does have Decision support system and Smart report generation tool for the convenience of the officers and decision takers.

• Recommendations As data needs to be cross referenced and there are certain improvements and provisions which I should recommend.

1. There should be interactive report generation functionality in MIS system which may help the officials to compare and study report in convenient and lucid manner. The format of MPR should be graphical representation with several indicators comparing with other equivalent services or with other service areas.

2. MPR should never comprise of numerical jargons. Displaying in terms of graphs, growth charts, trend analysis charts, percentage charts etc. will be of great help.

3. To avoid and detect redundancy and validity of data, MIS has to be equipped

with smart Rule validations techniques, so the data operator may make fewer mistakes. It is though a complex process of defining validation rule but surely can be implemented. The provision will help control duplication and error prone data from being saved. The current ambiguity of higher reporting percentage due multiple reporting from same center and absurd child death data of some districts may be controlled with this provision.

4. There is an urgent need to add new indicators to monitor growth to channelize

the services. Some of the indicators that need to be added in MPR form are Causes of under-five deaths,



This may include the following parameters:

Pneumonia Injuries Measles Diarrhea

HIV/AIDS Malaria Neonatal

Other parameters that are needed to be included are:

Infant child feeding habits Vitamin A supplement coverage Iodized Salt consumption trends(protection against IDD) Prevalence of anemia Drinking water and Sanitation Coverage

5. MIS should be equipped with Decision support system (DSS) , data sharing

provisions and data perdition alarm system so that it would help the planning and decision board to take action on real time basis. Response time to any outbreaks and issues will be reduced considerably with higher precision. Data sharing ability will ensure the credibility of the information and may encourage more local and foreign participation in the programs.

6. MIS is an essential part of any organization and thus proper care should be given to utilize it to the fullest. There is an urgent need of a data worker or a knowledge worker in the directorate office so that he can utilize and help analyze data. He should be also given charge of suggesting improvements. He should be acting like a manager who has both understanding of technical and nontechnical subjects of ICDS. I would recommend a M.B.A degree as preferable in this case, because data interpretation is mostly needed.



Observation | 2

Need to increase the public participation in the AWC, and opportunity to take advantage of this social movement of building a healthy and developed society

• Findings

The AWC is the foremost symbol of India’s commitment to its people. It is the most responsible mechanism placed at the ground level to reach people directly. Apart from delivering the services of ICDS, its act as a basic infrastructure for implementing other services at grass root level. AWW contribute to all sorts of development activities by the government. This system is said to have most promising provisions, but due to low community participation and ignorance the AWC fails to achieve its goals. The current environment has lots of irregularities and transparency has not been achieved despite many attempts. AWC fails to get the type of recognition, trust it deserves. It is unable to guide and mentor its population due to inefficient AWS, who mostly lack leadership qualities and are unable to handle the responsibilities.

• Recommendations

The AWW necessarily needs a lift up and its capacity building should be treated with utmost priority. Enhancing the AWW will help ensuring realization of the objectives in timely and accurate manner. This would help prepare AWC for wider responsibilities in the society. The recommendations for realizing the same are:

1. There is a provision to carry out a quick survey of all the facilities, especially mothers and children in those families in their respective area of work and maintain it in family register on regular basis. These surveys are current and usually are up to date, but contrary to that neither the state government nor other participating agencies take advantage of it. If accurate assessment are to be done than these data have to be incorporates and shared via centralized manner to use in social security allotment services (like UID card allotment).

2. There are no provisions to authenticate the list of beneficiaries and records of

the family survey. If we want to make the data reliable and to increase its usability then a proper mechanism has to be in place, which I would suggest in for increased Public participation and interest in knowing and verifying the beneficiaries by themselves. Throughout well maintained data can help track ghost beneficiaries and will help monitor and track other growth indicators.



3. The current realization of “Mahila Mandalas” is in a very disappointing state.

The liaison should be maintained by incorporating AWW with JEEVIKA (Bihar Rural Livelihood Project) workers. They should share the common platform of Mahila Mandalas meetings so that it could attain self-sufficiency in addressing the overall needs of women and get more recognition. Other involvements that will strengthen its functioning may be lady school teachers and girls of the primary/middle schools of the village which have relevance to their functions.

4. To gain public trust, AWC should act more responsibly there by focusing on

providing health and nutrition education and counseling on breast feeding/infant & young feeding practices to mothers. Anganwadi Workers, being close to the local community, can motivate married women to adopt family planning/birth control measure. There is also the need of conducting counseling sessions for parents on career awareness, life skill, motivation, so that a child could get better guidance from their parents. The effort would help make AWW a leader and motivator for their population. This will also help increase the social engagement of the people.

5. Regular Social Audit sessions have to be organized in more transparent

manner under the direct supervision of the CDPO’s .It may be collectively organized together taking some number of AWC together. This will ensure the people interactions with CDPO directly .A common “CDPO DARBAR” is suggested.

6. AWW shares the information relating to births that took place during the month with

the Panchayat Secretary/Gram Sabha Sewak/ANM whoever has been notified as Registrar/Sub Registrar of Births & Deaths in her village. This provision hasn’t been followed regularly. This should be made a compulsory and binding factor to register birth and death. AWW should be the main facilitator of issuing the certificates. This will insure proper assessment of trends.



Observation | 3

Monitoring system has been highly stressed and talked upon but many bottlenecks still exists.

• Findings

During my internship I found out that the existing practice of monitoring is very faulty. On an average every CDPO visits two AWC daily and if the AWC they control is large (say more than 100), their turn comes very late. Many a times there are reports that a certain AWC has been closed for three days or more and no one in the machinery knows about it until this issue has been taken up with the official. CDPO’s and LS express their inability to monitor each center daily and a real time feedback is never possible.

SNP has become a big issue in monitoring and has been subjected to a lot of controversies and irregularities. During my visits to AWC and interactions, I found that all unnecessary focus is given to the SNP other than providing complete package of services for early childhood development. AWW too dedicate their major time to SNP. I would thus say that ICDS is now only being treated as a “Nutrition Program”

• Recommendations

So as to insure complete package of services to the beneficiaries and better supervision and control, I would like to propose a model for increasing the focus of AWW on the services apart from feeding and improving monitoring of various centers. I would propose a Model for the same for achieving all the goals listed above.

Model:

As per my findings, I would recommend setting up a high capacity kitchen (for the afternoon meal program) with state of art technology, which would come under the direct supervision of CDPO’s and DPO.A centralized kitchen for every three block at least is proposed. The location of this may be at the intersection of these block areas or at the place from where the target AWC can be reached within 3 hours at max.

A centralized kitchen would ensure quality food with proper cooking techniques and would help add variety to the menu chart .As currently only those foods are being provided to children that are easy & quick to cook and have lesser ingredients. The quality component of the SNP is currently missing .So bringing the afternoon meal in centralized net will help supervise and monitor the quality



closely. With this in picture beneficiaries could be provided with egg and fish dishes which will be a good supplement for them other nutritional food could be easily provided utilizing this system .It should be noted that monitoring huge number of AWC may be difficult but monitoring a single kitchen will be lot easier, i.e. one against 400 AWC. Only CDPO office will share the answerability which will make them much more accountable and they could address the need more accurately.

Now the cooked food needs to be delivered to the respective AWC. For this the following are required:

1. A proper insulated food container capable of keeping food fresh and warm for longer time(say 4 hours)

2. A transportation van capable of carrying 25 containers, since each LS will accompany the van to their service area. These type of van should be on lease basis as they are only required of 4 hours of work.

3. Proper road connectivity should be an important factor, as the center should be reached at max 3 hours of journey.

As LS is assigned for every van for her area and she would be visiting her centers daily and inspection would be done very easily on daily basis. It would be a great opportunity to equip her with “DRISTI” program, which has provision to take photos of the inspected AWC and upload it on Real time basis through MMS or GPRS application via mobile. Currently “DRISTI” is only used by CDPO’s. This should also have provision of tracking LS movement during duty via location based service of Google maps.

Utilizing this model, it can be also used to supply government issued THR package to respective AWC. Food grains from FCI storage and government agencies which can be procured at cheaper rate should be distributed. This will insure huge saving done on buying THR items from market thereby keeping the quality component intact.

Ensuring the above will help achieve the following:

1. More healthy food will be in reach and Children will love their food and Varity in menu will encourage them.

2. It will help curb irregularity of SNP program and can make the whole system centralized as lesser cash spending responsibility will be on AWW.

3. The main idea of this model is to save the time of AWW in SNP program and utilize it in focusing on other services.

4. It should create a fool prove mechanism to keep check on closure of AWC, which was not detected earlier easily.

5. The attendance would be verified easily and would help keep check on ghost beneficiaries.



Observation |4

Capacity building and training & selection procedure of frontline workers needs to be redefined.

• Findings

The present condition of majority of AWW working is very unsatisfactory. During my interaction, most of the frontend workers complained about their workload. They expressed their inability and lack of training skill in performing mandatory services of ICDS. Some were even unable to fill growth charts properly.

They lacked proper training. Their motivation level was very low and they lacked credibility to educate their women population as most of them had poor leadership & mentoring skills. They lacked comprehensive approach towards problem solving and counseling. They failed to understand the sensitivity of their work and services and hence didn’t possess the belongingness to the services.

• Recommendations

Unlike the CDPO’s and other higher officials who get training on multiple spheres on areas like Leadership, Motivation, Disaster Management and on other social and economic issues , the frontend workers on other hand are denied this type of exposure. My interaction with CDPO’s provided me a positive feedback of their experience with NIPCEED as fruitful and of great practicality. Other Players in this subject are AWTC, MLTC.

So, similar type of work is required to be performed for ground level workers but in slightly different context. For this a new module of training should be prepared to incorporate all the above mentioned areas. AWW’s has to be a good leader, motivator and counselor. She should have decisions taking capabilities in situation of urgency for smooth running of services.

My recommendation would be for setting up yearly (regular) training camp at district or state level for the above topics. The camp should have quality training partners like NIPCEED, which has high specialization in the field. The Camp should be for 4 to 5 day event, where the AWW may get to interact with other fellow workers and this would help them inculcate a sense of belongingness.



The program should have program in form of discussion panels of experts and higher officials. Single day camp don’t fulfill their purpose as everyone is in a hurry to return back thus whole essence of event is lost.

Training the frontend workers about the services and delivery will help them to understand ICDS better and training them on leadership qualities ,motivation will help them enhance their capabilities .Disaster management will help them handle the situation of disease expression, flood or other natural calamities in a better way.



Observation |5

No provision to Reward and Recognize contributions of frontend workers.

• Findings

The present system only advocates for rewarding the higher officers, the frontend workers are not included. Some evidences were seen of such program but were not practiced regularly. Encouraging the frontend worker is an essential tool for increasing their participation. There should be these type of objectives put in place so that a sense of competition could prevail. Differentiating performing and non performing workers has never been done. Implementing salary cut on non-performers never gives them opportunity to improve but they try to manage irregularities in such a manner that their losses are covered.

• Recommendations

Encouraging the frontend workers to perform more and motivate them not to adopt unethical practices, a reward system is much needed. My emphasis would be on creating a “FAMOUS–INFAMOUS Recognition Culture “ & “Blacklist Model”.

Model for FAMOUS –INFAMOUS Recognition Culture

The proposed provisions are as follows:

1. Rewarding those workers whose performance is comparatively better than the average workers. I should note it here that awarding at least 5 workers from a block will be a source of motivation and other will try to perform better. Reward may include certification from District Magistrate or it could be in the form of some appreciation money.

2. A single most performing worker should be made “FACE of ICDS” at district level and thus should be given exposure to attend meetings at district level and state level. She should invited to attend special camps and training ,so that could represent the district and learn more .



3. For the non-performing Workers who are constantly indulged in irregularities and don’t respect the warning system like salary fine or DE selection. I would propose a public humiliation model for infamous workers.

BLACK LIST Model Public humiliation in the form of black listing a worker, where a non-performer name is painted in bold letters over a black painted list outside block offices or district headquarters or it can be outside CDPO’s and DPO office. The importance of this provision if implemented would be that it would be on full public view , fellow coworkers would see it and perceive it as a punishment. The defaulter would perceive it as a public humiliation and humiliation by fellow workers. She would try to get her name removed from the list by performing better next time. Previously, the warning system used fine and termination as an only mechanism but the system failed to help the workers abandon unethical practices. The current proposed system would give 3 warning to the non-performer before termination their services thereby giving proper chance for improvement.

4. The proposed FAMOUS–INFAMOUS Recognition Culture should be made an import factor for deciding in promotion of AWS to LS.



Observation | 6

Creating activities for young children and pampering them to know their talents

• Findings

The current mechanism doesn’t promote extracurricular activities (i.e., art and craft, sport, etc.) for children’s. The current schedules of daily activities are very limited for a fast growing child. A child should get lot of exposure to activities apart from being held in a AWC room. During my internship all most every AWC was not equipped to cater these needs.

• Recommendations

1. A child should be encouraged in activities of all kind which would ensure proper growth of physical and mental state of child. AWS should be educated about the brain games, fun games to keep child busy in AWC.

2. There should a monthly provision of educational videos for children ,the required equipment’s are cheap to take on lease. Educational videos can make learning experience fun and ICDS could well come up with a package of educational cd’s.

3. Recognizing a child talent in early stages is a good mechanism to set child’s

career path rolling and rewarding the same may boost child and there guardian commitment for the engagement. Taking these things in mind a extracurricular camp should be organized yearly at district level where shortlisted children may compete on different type of activities.

4. The AWC should be mandatorily located at places where playing space is

available. Setting it up with primary school can be very beneficial.



Observation | 7

The hierarchical architecture at district level doesn’t ensure proper work cohesion between CDPO’s and DPO.

• Findings

During my visit to Nalanda & Jehanabad ,it was a common observation that the relationship between the CDPO’s and DPO were strained .The group cohesion was completely missing .The hierarchical order of working was ignored. The DM played an important role in district administration as his higher involvement is sought for timely and successful implementation of services.

DM active involvement in ICDS programs does boost the results and reachability. His keenness helps to supervise and monitor ICDS program as he enjoys monopoly in admiration activities. At the same time his active involvement may hamper the order of authority by often bypassing DPO and directly handling CDPO’S and making them to report directly to his office.

• Recommendations

DM on one side likes to monitor and guide CDPO’s and DPO according to his comport. On the other hand both CDPO’s and DPO report to his office directly thereby ignoring the hierarchical structure.

DM higher involvement surely reduces the answerability of CDPO’s to DPO. DPO is theoretically in charge and is liable to get responsible of any shortcomings and often blamed but in reality he has lose control over his immediate subordinates. DPO is struggling to take control and CDPO’s don’t feel the answerability to the post. They lack sense of trust among each other. My recommendation to this problem would be:

1. The protocol of hierarchy should be respected and followed. The process of answerability and monitoring would be only fruitful if done according to rule book of the structure.

2. DM should always root reports through DPO and his information flow channel should always be DPO.



3. A sense of caution should always be there at DM office to always ensure proper work cohesion between CDPO’s and DPO.

4. Provision of directly reporting to DM office should be removed from CDPO’s

responsibility.

5. Capacities building of DPO are much needed in current scenario. A weak DPO office may be a source of many inconveniences to icds. To help perform DPO office should work in more transparent and systematic manner. My visit to Nalanda DPO office showed that the staffs were not following standard norms for grievances disposal and they didn’t act in a responsible manner to assist DPO in the disposal of her work. Personal interest and irregularity at lower staff level cannot be ruled. So I suggest experiences staffs and clerks are needed there. Regular reshuffling of office clerks is needed. DPO office should practice proper office norms for its working.



Observation | 8

Need to improve Distribution and procurement model of ICDS

• Findings

The availability of necessary basic item is an important factor for smooth running of AWC. The basic item may include utensils, black slates, poster, soap, equipment of safe drinking water, furniture, carpet, playing kit. During my visit I found out that most of the AWC didn’t had the entire item and have been managing of their own. They have been waiting for the procurement or the distribution to happen. The money allotted for spending in this item fails to address the needs properly as there a lack of fund and the guidance for spending the money is complicated. Even CDPO’s are not clear on mode of the Spending.

• Recommendations

Considering the observed facts and delays, I would suggest that procurement system should be centralized for all items and availability of each item could be insured on certain time frame basis. For realizing the objective I would suggest a model.

Model for distribution System

1. Pre analysis and estimation of requirements for coming fiscal year should be compiled by DPO for their area and sent to the Directorate office.

2. A centralized total requirement list of the demands of promised items should be made available to the AWC directly without touching the complexity of dealing with the treasury offices and complex paper work.

3. The Directorate will invite tenders for all its requirements and insure the timely and proper supply of items. Items provided will have a certain life span allotted to it, so that it could be requested only after certain time duration.

This model will aim to achieve time and regular procurement of items and save AWC from the burden of paper work. As this model doesn’t involve cash in hands of AWW, so the mismanagement of funds is ruled out. Most importantly it will help save time of AWW to focus on other services.



Conclusion

To conclude, greater clarity and focus is needed if ICDS program is to make a substantial dent in the problem of persistent under nutrition in Bihar. In particular, the findings identified earlier need to be resolved so that overall working is improved. Moreover, leadership, commitment and clever implementation are necessary to address some of the structural Inefficiencies of ICDS and many other public programs associated, including a weak information system, limited orientation towards results and lack of accountability for Performance at all levels, which are hindering the success of the program. The current policy does have many well drafted provisions but bridging the gap between the policy intentions of ICDS and its actual implementation is probably the single biggest challenge in international nutrition and other services with large fiscal and Institutional implications and a huge potential long-term impact on human development and economic growth. ICDS programs should be made a compulsory development program for achieving the following objectives:

• Higher intelligence score • Higher & timelier school enrollment • Improved nutrition and health status • Improved social and emotional behavior • Improved child – parent relationship • Increased earning potential & economic sufficiency as an adult.

Documents

Investing In Young Children and Prosperity Internship... · 2017-01-23 · Investing In Young Children and Prosperity . Report on ICDS for improving the delivery system of services