Government puts ‘anganwadi’ workers on the frontline to identify & track children with disabilities | India News

NEW DELHI: In a major move to step up early identification of disabilities and linking children and their families to interventions, the Centre on Tuesday launched the ‘Anganwadi protocol’.
The protocol lays down a detailed plan for training workers to identify children with disabilities and screen and connect them to early intervention programmes of the health ministryand department of empowerment of persons with disabilities of the social justice ministry.This is the first time a protocol focused on children with disabilities under the anganwadi system has been prepared.
“We know 85% of a child’s mental development happens by the age of six. Now under this protocol grassroots level data about children with disabilities will become available through anganwadi workers, and the children can be further tracked through the Poshan Tracker application of the ministry,” women and child development minister Smriti Irani said at the launch of the protocol. The app has data of all beneficiaries on the platform which is updated on a real time basis.
There are around 16 lakh anganwadis in the countries manned by close to 26 lakh anganwadi workers and helpers catering to over eight crore children in the 0-6 years age group.
Under this protocol, all children will be assessed for delays in their development milestones and screened for early signs and symptoms, their families will receive support and referrals, and the anganwadi workers will work with them every day. “As per research, one-third of most disabilities in India can be prevented, if they are caught early enough and adequately addressed,” it is stated in the protocol.
The government sees the anganwadi system with its vast network of 0-6 year old children as the largest potential source for early screening and support.
As per Census 2011 there are about 20.42 lakh children 0-6 years with disabilities comprising 7% of the child population in the country. With the launch of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 which now recognises 21 disabilities, therefore the number of children with disabilities would have clearly increased significantly even if one goes by a conservative estimate of 2% overall prevalence of disability.
In the protocol the steps for referral are clearly laid out with the anganwadi expected to refer to ASHA and ANM in the area, all such children who are regularly missing their milestones, or reflect visible signs and symptoms of disabilities. The Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA) and Auxiliary Nurse and Midwife (ANM) will escalate the matter to the primary health centre or the Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram teams. The Angwadi workers will also support the family to apply for the unique disability identification card (UDID) for disability certification.
The WCD minister also shared that the anganwadis will also focus on children with disabilities in keeping with the mandate setout in the National Education Policy-2020 that emphasises on prioritising integration of students with special needs into mainstream schools.
According to the WCD ministry to deliver on the goals under NEP, the ‘Poshan Bhi Padhai Bhi’ programme at anganwadis has adopted the play-based and activity-based learning pedagogy and strongly advocates special and timely support for children with disabilities. Based on the identification of children with disabilities, the anganwadi centres will be up-skilled to adopt a multi-sensory and toy-based approach to address the different needs of children.
The WCD minister said that once the identification of children with disabilities is done, the anganwadis will also be able to assess the infrastructure needs to cater to the special requirements of such children.