Beti Bachao Beti Padhao Scheme: 80% funds spent on advertisement

Beti Bachao Beti Padhao: Relevance

• GS 2: Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Beti Bachao Beti Padhao: Context

• Recently, the Parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women tabled a report in Lok Sabha and said that the Central Government has spent around 80% of the total funds allocated to BBBP scheme on advertisement.

Beti Bachao Beti Padhao: Key points

• In the same period, the scheme has underperformed at the state level despite Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) pointing out “very less spending” in 2016-17.
• Between 2014-15 and 2019-20, the states have utilised only 25% of the total funds released by the central government.
• The committee has reported that the underutilisation has caused ill performance of the scheme.
• Poshan Abhiyan, a scheme to address malnutrition has also witnessed underutilisation of funds.
• The panel has emphasised on the need to focus on education and health under BBBP rather than on advertisements.
• The panel has recommended a regular review of proper utilisation of funds at the state and central level.

Beti Bachao Beti Padhao: Girl enrolment during COVID

• The committee has also informed that the COVID-19 crisis has disproportionately affected adolescent girls, especially among the socially and economically backward groups.
• The education ministry said that the school closure in India has affected 320 million children enrolled from pre-primary to tertiary levels of education.
  • It has been estimated that of these, about 158 million are female students.
  • There is a growing concern that the pandemic will disproportionately affect adolescent girls.
  • Post pandemic, this can lead to a higher risk of girls permanently dropping out of school and reversing the gains made in recent years.

Parliamentary Committee Recommendations

• Noting the highest dropout rates are at the secondary and high school levels, the committee suggested “incentivizing participation” to help more girls continue their schooling.
• Provisions of targeted scholarships, conditional cash transfers, and bicycles for transport can significantly increase the retention of girls in schools.

About BBBP scheme

• This is a joint initiative of Ministry of Women and Child Development, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Human Resource Development.
• Government has announced Beti Bachao Beti Padhao initiative to ensure survival, protection and empowerment of the girl child.
• Social construct discriminating against girls on the one hand, easy availability, affordability and subsequent misuse of diagnostic tools on the other hand, have been critical in increasing Sex Selective Elimination of girls leading to low Child Sex Ratio.

BBBP scheme objectives

• Prevention of gender biased sex selective elimination
• Ensuring survival & protection of the girl child
• Ensuring education and participation of the girl child.

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