Cabinet approves National Nutrition Mission

The Centre has given its approval to set up a six-tier oversight mechanism for an "effective" implementation of the National Nutrition Mission (NNM) to address malnutrition and stunting among children.

The Union Cabinet has also given its approval to roll out a provision for distribution of smartphones to Anganwadi workers and tablets to the supervisors for real-time monitoring of the implementation of the  NNM and timely action to remove the bottlenecks.

It also decided to bring Union health ministry, Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation and the Women and Child Development Ministry on a common platform to ensure that they work together to combat malnutrition in the country, "instead of working in silos."

To support the execution of these policy interventions, the Union Cabinet approved a budget of Rs 9,046.17 crore, which will be spent over a period of three years, starting from the current fiscal.

"The decision was taken at the Cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told reporters here addressing a joint press conference with the Health Minister J P Nadda and Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi.

Under the new strategy, oversight bodies for the NNM will be set up in every block, district and the state level. There will be an apex body for the NNM at the national level as well.  

In the first phase of implementation of the NNM under the reworked strategy, the Centre will cover a total of 315 districts, worst-affected by malnutrition, in 2017-18. In the second phase (2018-19), a total of 225 new districts will be added. In the next fiscal (2019-20), the rest of the districts will be added for implementation of the programmes under the NNM.