New Delhi, May 6 (Inditop.com) With high levels of malnutrition and denial of basic rights, quality of life of a less privileged child in the Indian capital is on the decline, a report released Thursday said.
The report, ‘Declining Quality of Life of the Young Child in Delhi’, has been put together by Delhi Forces, an NGO, through a survey in three slums in the capital.
“Huge amounts of money is being pumped in for the Commonwealth Games by the government, but when it comes to the poor people of Delhi, there is no budget,” said Biraj Patnaik, principle adviser to the commissioners of the Supreme Court, in a press meet in the capital.
“Declining quality of governance, lack of accountability and redressal mechanisms, leave the less privileged in Delhi feeling helpless,” he added.
According to the report, 47 percent of the capital’s urban poor are malnourished.
Vandana Prasad, advisor to Commissioners Right to Food, while speaking on the report, said: “There is a gross denial of basic rights in the three slums where the survey was conducted, like many other places in the capital. There is a lack of electricity and water supply in the permanent settlements, denial of payment of minimum wages and children’s rights to survival, protection and development.”
“In the three slums, none of the persons had ration cards, only one person had a below poverty line (BPL) card and there are no Anganwadi (mother-child care) centres,” she added.
“The government is violating the Supreme Court orders by not providing Anganwadis on a priority basis for communities that are demanding it within the stipulated period of three months. The lack of creches on worksites is a direct infringement of the obligations the government is accountable for under the Construction Worker’s Act, 1996,” Prasad further said.
Amod Kanth, chairperson of the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR), said: “Out of a 7,000,000 population that resides in the slums, nearly 50 percent are children. It is indeed a matter of great shame that the needs of such a large segment of the neglected and deprived population are not being addressed.”
