Anganwadi Centres to restart in Goa after 2 years

Directorate of Women and Child development has decided to restart all Anganwadis, in Goa from July 1. Anganwadis are a type of rural child care welfare centre, that have not been in operational in the state since the advent of COVID-19. As such, the centres starting now will work in accordance to post pandemic precautions. They will also keep strict vigil and also monitor regular doctor-visits in rural and remote locations.

The Anganwadi system in one village is managed by a single worker, who is chosen from the community and has been trained for four months in relevant topics. Each Anganwadi worker covers a population of about 1,000 people.

For every 10 anganwadi workers, there is an anganwadi superior to provide guidance, who is known as Mukhya Sevika. Today, in India about 2 million anganwadi workers are reaching out to a population of 70 million women, children and sick people in rural areas.

The Goa state government has recently sought a Centre’s sanction to set up 60 new Anganwadis to commemorate 60 years of its liberation. Notably, the state presently has 1,262 Anganwadi centres and has requested the Union's help to create two model Angwadias in each block.

Aanganwadi is a government sponsored child-care and mother-care development programme in India, at the village level. It primarily caters to children between the age group of 0-6 year. The concept was launched by the India government in 1975 as part of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program to combat child hunger and malnutrition.

Aanganwadi provides three basic services under ICDS, namely nutrition, heath and pre-school education.