Gujarat spends Rs 1161 crore to fight malnourished

AHMEDABAD: The State Government to fight malnourished has spent over Rs 1161.26 crore in two years from 2014-15. Of these Rs485 crore were given as reimbursement grant by the central government.
The state government in reply to the question of Dariyapur MLA Gyasuddin Shaikh has said tht in 2014-15 the state had spent 546.74 crore to provide supplementary diet to malnourished children in the state.However, in the year 2015-16 the state has spent Rs 614.52 crore. The government claimed that about 50% of the amount spent by the Government reimbursed to the state by the central government as reimbursement grant.
It is worth recalling that the 3.41% of the children attending Anganwadi severely acute malnourished (SAM). Of the 43 lakh children of Anganwadis screened for malnourished, nearly 1.47 lakh were identified as severely acute malnourished children.
This was stated in the Socio-Economic Review of Gujarat for the year 2015-16. Officials said that this was the number of severe acute malnourished. The number of malnourished children could be very high. Meanwhile in another to the question of Sanand MLA said that in Ahmedabad district there were 23147 children who were malnourished and of these 418 were SAM.
The state has begun 12 centre were 240 severely malnourished children were being treated. The Government further said that as on December 31, 2015 there were 3656 children who were under treatment and of these in two months 339 children have shown improvement and have been upgraded to higher category.