GUWAHATI, Sept 4 - Joining the rest of the nation in taking the Poshan Abhiyaan to address nutritional deficiencies, Governor Prof Jagdish Mukhi today launched the ceremonial beginning of Poshan Maah (Poshan Month) at a function held at the Srimanta Sankaradeva Kalakhshetra here.
It may be noted that the entire month of September is being celebrated as Rashtriya Poshan Maah and this year the theme is �Complementary feeding� with the vision to address malnutrition with a targeted approach by 2022.
Speaking on the occasion, Governor Mukhi said the Poshan Abhiyaan has been launched to emphasise the need for healthy nutrition and it should be the one-liner objective to generate awareness about this mission to involve more and more people so that no targeted group is left behind. At the same time he observed that special emphasis should be given in the tea garden areas to make up for the nutritional deficiency and reduce low birth weight in those areas. He said that though the programme strives to reduce the level of stunting, under-nutrition, anaemia and low birth weight among babies, without unified efforts it would be very difficult to achieve the target. He therefore called for inter-departmental convergence for the success of the objective.
The Governor also emphasised the need for coordination, convergence and cordiality among all the stakeholders for making the Poshan Maah a huge success. He also advocated an ICT-based real time monitoring system, incentivising anganwadi workers for using IT-based tools, introducing measurement of height of children at anganwadi centres and social audits to achieve the objective of attaining a malnutrition-free India by 2022.
Prof Mukhi urged Social Welfare Minister Pramila Rani Brahma to motivate officers of the government along with other stakeholders to transform the Poshan Abhiyaan into a �jana andolan� (mass movement) so that no target group is deprived of essential nutrition. He also appealed to everybody to propel Poshan Abhiyaan as a tool to social empowerment.
As part of the programme a pledge was also administered to make a malnutrition-free India by 2022.
Social Welfare Minister Brahma also highlighted the key steps taken by her department in implementing the Poshan Maah and called upon the stakeholders to put in their best efforts to achieve the goal and wipe out malnutrition by 2022.
Additional Chief Secretary, Social Welfare Jishnu Baruah, Secretary, Social Welfare Hemen Das and Director in-charge of Social Welfare Department Kansar Jami Hilaly also spoke on the occasion.
