Non-compliance of Uttar Pradesh government with Supreme Court orders

Hungercomp/311/UP
05.06.2005

To
Smt. Neera Yadav,
Chief Secretary,
Govt. of Uttar Pradesh,
Lucknow-226001

Sub: Repeated complaints of malnutrition deaths, dated
04.02.2005, 19.03.2005, 16.04.2005, 18.04.2005 and 21.04.2005, from districts of Varanasi, Sonebhadra, Jaunpur, Khusinagar and Mirzapur and poor performance of food schemes

Dear Smt. Yadav,

Kindly refer to my letter dated 19.10.2004, whereby I requested you to take action on a complaint which brought to my notice 62 hunger deaths in eastern Uttar Pradesh. Subsequently I have received another letter
from the complainant, stating that no action has been taken on the complaint and now the hunger death toll in the area has increased to 93.

In another letter dated 25.11.2005, I brought to your notice the alleged hunger death of Nagina Mushahar, in Dhogara village, Turkpatti thana, Khushinagar District. While I have received no enquiry or 'action taken report' on this, I received another complaint letter on 06.12.2004 stating that no action on the earlier complaint has been taken and that Nagina Mushhar's family continues to be on the verge of
starvation.

I have also received 6 complaint letters on malnutrition deaths and non-performance of food schemes. These reports of malnutrition deaths reported in districts of Varanasi, Sonebhadra, Jaunpur, Khusinagar and Mirzapur (see appendix 1 for the district wise compilation of 6 complaint letters) show that Supreme Court orders are not being implemented in the state.

Performance of the food schemes

A look at the available information on food schemes implemented in these districts presents a very grim picture. In Varanasi, Sonebhadra, Jaunpur, Khusinagar and Mirzapur, from where the deaths are reported, only 31% of the children under 0-6 age group are covered by ICDS. Seventy-one additional ICDS projects (in addition to the existing 64 projects) are required to cover the population as per existing norms. Even among the existing 64 projects nearly 9% of the anganwadi centres are not reporting to your Department of Women and Child Development. The staffing in these projects is also very poor with non-appointment of 19% of the sanctioned anganwadi workers (AWWs) and 30 % of the
sanctioned anganwadi helpers (AWHs) in Mirzapur and 11% of the sanctioned AWWs and 12 % of the sanctioned AWHs in Jaunpur (see appendix 2).

In the case of employment related schemes, the five aforementioned districts have utilized only 78% of the allocated funds and 56% of sanctioned food grains under the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana (SGRY). Again Mirzapur performed worst with only 39% utilization of food grains. This is despite the fact that Mirzapur is a poor district, and here the percentage of agricultural labour to main workers is 33.78 % (as against 21.4% for UP) and percentage of marginal workers to main workers is 3.39 % (as against 2.94 % for UP). Except Jaunpur in the other three districts (Varanasi, Sonebhadra and Khusinagar) too the
proportion of agriculture workers and marginal workers to main workers is much higher than that in U.P. on average.

Though in addition to SGRY, the National Food For Work Scheme was also in operation in districts of Sonebhadra, Mirzapur and Khusinagar, only 7.5 % and 8.6 % of the funds and food-grains were utilized in
these districts.

Another fact which is distressing is that in districts of Varanasi, Jaunpur and Khusinagar, women beneficiaries under SGRY constituted of only 13%, 4% and 18% of the total beneficiaries, which is much below the norm of 30 %, which is the proportion of reservation for women in employment schemes.

In light of continued reports of hunger deaths and poor implementation of food schemes, I recommend the following:

1. Set up district-wise enquiries on the reported hunger deaths and provide necessary assistance to these families.

2. In a letter dated 9.11.2004, No. 3872/26-06-04, it was mentioned that to prevent malnutrition deaths, discussions are in process to make the village level officials and gram pradhan accountable and to provide
adequate funds at district level to provide immediate relief to people in danger of hunger. It was also mentioned that I will be briefed on steps taken on these soon. I request you to kindly update me on the
developments in this regard.

3. Ensure that all AWCs are operational and reporting and all vacancies are filled in ICDS projects, further send us the details on the steps taken to increase the number of ICDS projects as per existing guidelines.

4. Send a report on the reasons for low utilization under SGRY and NFFWSs and action taken to ensure full utilization of food grain and funds under these schemes.

With regards

[Signed]
Dr N C Saxena