BETI BACHAO BETI PADHAO (Part II)
Historically, the highest dropouts from secondary schools were the girls and had half the probability of getting enrolled in schools than boys. Research has shown that girls who complete their high school education are less likely to have underage pregnancy.
Even today, one million girls under the age of 15 get pregnant every year, that too with delivery-related complications, like children being born with a survival rate of 50%. Thus, millions of girls lose their chance of education and their lives are spoiled.
In her budget speech, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman stated that BBBP has yielded enormous results as the Gross Enrolment Ratio of girls across all levels of education is higher than that of boys. In 2017–18, Gross Enrolment Ratio for girls in secondary schools had increased to 80% while for boys increased to 76%. Annual ASER (annual status of education report) found that a still greater proportion of girl children are out of school as compared to boys. Although, the gap is decreasing over time.
Some of the innovative inventions under BBBP
- Visibility of the issue in the public domain, i.e., display of statistics of the number of girls born as compared to the number of boys through Gudda Guddi boards. Jalgaon district, Maharashtra has installed digital Guddi Gudda Display Boards in offices and public places.
- Brand Visibility of BBBP logo.
- Breaking gender stereotypes and challenging son-centric rituals. Celebration of Birth of Girl Child, linking Sukanya Samriddhi accounts with the birth of girl child, felicitating parents, and prevention of child marriages.
- Local champions are mobilising youth from Gram Panchayats and villages to work as community volunteers under BBBP. They are selected by District Administration as role models excelling in different fields.
- Enrolment Campaigns/drives focusing on girl child education such as “School Chalein Hum” by Jalgaon, Maharashtra, “Aao School Chalein” by Sikar, Rajasthan, “Apna Baccha Apna Vidyalaya” and “Collector ki Class” by Jhunjhunu district, Rajasthan.
- Campaigns are being undertaken by States and Districts to prevent Child Marriage. Cuddalore district (Tamil Nadu) has prevented several by taking it in a campaign involving all stakeholders. Notapalli village is declared a Child Marriage free village. This has motivated other gram panchayats to pass similar resolutions to prevent child marriage in their respective panchayats and villages.
- Special Gram Sabha/Mahila Sabha on declining Child Sex Ratio in the districts of Rajasthan, Haryana.
- Theme based support from Civil Society Organizations like “Beti Bachao Beti Padhao Week- The Daughters of New India” to influence national and mainstream discourse in favour of girls and women and to bring visibility to BBBP.
- Pan India Expansion of BBBP in 640 districts of the country.
- Campaign against Child Sexual Abuse in South-District, Delhi.
- Honouring Panchayats with High Sex Ratios in Punjab.
- Rapid Reporting System for the PCPNDT Act in Hyderabad.
- Generating awareness on Menstrual Hygiene Management in Daman and Diu.
Achievements of BBBP
This scheme has focused on several issues related to the empowerment of women. BBBP has been a success at tackling some issues of girl child rights and women empowerment.
- Campaigns initiated by various state governments for promoting education have been very effective.
- Child marriages are being prevented as a major part of the campaign.
- Gender stereotypes and son centric issues are being been eradicated to an extent by the campaigns like ‘Selfie with Daughters’, encouragement of celebration of girl child etc.
- As per an article published in The Hindu, a study by Foundation for Reproductive Health Services (FRHS) across six states and 1500 chemists between January to March 2020 revealed that over-regulation of drugs to curb gender-biased sex selection through programmes like BBBP has reduced access to safe, legal, and cost-effective abortion.
Sex Ratio — The biggest challenge for Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao
More than education, BBBP’s challenge was revealed in sex ratio data. It was found in 2017 that India’s sex ratio at birth had gotten worse. From the year 2015–17, only 896 females were born for every 1000 males. The balance is much less in urban areas than in rural areas.
The reason for this is a preference for male children. Various methods are there by which sex ratio can and has been reversed, such as women’s education, campaigns on sensitisation of women and children, awards for best parents, awards for daring girls standing up as role models in society, and much more.
Though there has been an improvement in the CSR at the national level, from 918 to 934 girls per 1000 boys as per Health Management Information System in the year 2019–20, yet this is not the end as the issue of sex ratio is the direct preference for BBBP. Still, it is restricted to purely awareness and gender equality which requires a multi-pronged approach.
Financial Discrepancies
In the 2020 Budget, Rs. 220 crores were given to the scheme, but it works out to Rs. 34 Lakh per district and money isn’t spent as a whole, which means actual spending on the scheme is lower than budget estimates, i.e. funds allocated are not fully utilised.
Since the start, a total of Rs. 928 crores have been allocated till 2019–20 by the government. However, only Rs.540.92 crores have been utilised till March 2020, i.e. 585 of the total allocation. More than 75% was used for media advocacy from 2017–18 and 2018–19.
A total of Rs. 280 crores have been allocated for the year 2020–21, from which Rs 96.7 lakh has been spent on media advocacy till September 2020. Only 62% of the funds released have been used for the scheme since its inception of the same.
State governments are supposed to maintain separate records of expenses incurred for the implementation of the scheme and submit a statement of expenditure along with a progress report for every quarter apart from the amount given as grant in aid for the cost of activities such as inter-sectoral consultation, meeting of State Task Force, Training and Capacity Building, sensitisation programmes, awareness generation activities, monitoring and evaluation and sectorial activities of ministries.
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The greatest amount used by states since the introduction of the scheme is Rs. 67.62 crores, i.e. 54.6% in the year 2019–20. Only five states and one UT utilised up to 80% in six years. Those states are Sikkim, Chhattisgarh, Tripura, Nagaland and Puducherry. Punjab, Telangana and Tamil Nadu have utilised more than 70%. Kerala and Karnataka used more than 60% of the funds.
There is no provision for cash benefits in BBBP, but some women in Nadia District in 2017 assembled before the head post office with forms that falsely promised Rs.2 lakh for taking part in the scheme. Some women dropped the papers in envelopes in the letterbox. The others sent them through the registered post. According to the post office official, they received 200 forms that day.
According to the DM of the district, they used a public address system to make people aware that the money scheme was fake. Also, the government officials were asked not to sign such forms. He also said that they heard about photocopy shops being the source of such forms and will take action against them.
Minister of State for Women and Child Development said in the Rajya Sabha that a CBI probe was ordered after some fake BBBP forms with a false promise of cash incentive of Rs. 2 lakh were received from Haryana, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Delhi and West Bengal.
The vision of saving girls and educating them better requires more than just one scheme. BBBP could help address prejudices, but it cannot work in isolation. Although publicity is a crucial component of the scheme it cannot help to improve education without much-needed education sector reform. Further, female volunteers could be identified at the grassroots for training and advocacy, and the government should also focus on health infrastructure.
Views are the writer’s own and do not necessarily represent the viewpoint of Volunteers Collective.
Written by Jasleen Kaur. Jasleen was an intern at Volunteers Collective and a contributor to the collective’s publishing platform. She can be reached out at jasleenkhalsa97@gmail.com.
