Bhubaneswar/Kaliapani: A special team from National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) cancelled its visit to hilltop Nagada village and instead visited Ashokjhar at the foothill due to heavy rainfall Wednesday.
The team comprising NCPCR member Rupa Kapoor, technical officer Priyanka Singh, SCPCR member Sandhyabati Pradhan and programme manager Manoj Tripathy of state child protection council (SCPC) left for Nagada in the morning. The team after its arrival Wednesday visited Deogaon village.
They, however, had to cancel their visit to Nagada after the vehicle got stuck in mud before they could reach Deogaon. Left with no option, all the officials alighted from the vehicle and treaded cautiously on the muddy road to reach Ashokjhar where they met some men and children of the Juanga tribe and enquired about their problems.
They discussed about the education facilities, Anganwadi programmes and healthcare facilities provided to them and various developmental initiative being implemented by the district administration.
They met village head Dukhia Pradhan and some youths and enquired from them about the periodicity, place and amount of nutritious food being given to pregnant women. The team sought to know whether the benefits of various developmental schemes being implemented by the administration were reaching the village.
The team members expressed their displeasure when they came to know that a school run by voluntary outfit Aspire has been closed. They directed Aspire’s coordinator D Naresh and Saroj Mahakur to send all the children of school going age to Deogaon school in a van till the school reopens.
The team members laid stress on preparing various kinds of food and distributing them among the Juanga children in a bid to attract them for studies. They asked the authorities to conduct vaccination drives, health check-up and malaria eradication programme at regular intervals.
Later in the day, the team reached Deogaon where they discussed with the children about their studies and asked them about the quality of mid-day meals provided to them.
Addressing the media after returning to the capital city, the NCPCR delegation expressed their satisfaction over the steps taken by the state government to tackle the situation and suggested the government to identify cut off villages like Nagada and take necessary steps to avoid recurrence of the incident.
“The Nagada village is reeling under malnutrition problem. We have realized that lack of road connectivity is the reason behind the problems at the village. We are satisfied with the action taken by the state government to tackle the situation,” Rupa Kapoor said.
The NCPCR delegation would once again visit Nagada after around four months to take stock of the development works, she said. The delegation would submit a report to the NCPCR chairman within a week.
This is the third Central team that came here to take stock of the situation and suggest measures to the state government to tackle the situation. PNN
