The Hindu : Officials differ over infant mortality rate

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Mar 12, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad

Officials differ over infant mortality rate

By Our Special Correspondent

GULBARGA March 11. The monthly review meeting of Karnataka Development Programmes (KDP) in Gulbarga District today witnessed contradictory claims on infant mortality rate by officials of the Health Department and the Women and Child Development (W&CD) Department.

While officials of the W&CD Department claimed that the infant mortality rate was 19 for every 1,000 live births in Gulbarga District, those from the District Health Office put the infant mortality rate at 58.

The claim made by the officials of the W&CD Department took participants at the meeting by surprise, since such a low infant mortality rate prevailed only in some countries where the health infrastructure facility was better than that in India. The State average of infant mortality rates was 1000:58. Gulbarga District is one of the few districts in the country where the number of deliveries at hospitals and other health institutions is very low. The districts where the number is low have high infant mortality rates.

Officials of both departments maintained that their figures had been scientifically prepared. The Gulbarga Zilla Panchayat President, Amatappa Kandakur, and the Chief Executive Officer, M. Maheshwar Rao, directed the officials of the DHO and the W&CD Department to provide the correct picture about the infant mortality rate in the district at the next meeting of the KDP.

Mr. Rao said the Government had issued a circular to all district-level officials to maintain strict vigil on the quality of the works taken up by government agencies and executed by contractors. The CEO had been asked to conduct surprise checks and file reports to the Government about the quality of the works executed.

Mr. Rao said that based on the reports, the Government would blacklist contractors and initiate disciplinary action against officials who supervised the execution of programmes.

On complaints about delays in providing cooking gas connections to centres in Sedam and Jewargi taluks where the Mid-day Meal Scheme was being implemented, Mr. Rao directed officials totake steps to provide connections immediately.

On the scam in the Gulbarga City Urban Cooperative Bank, which has suspended its operations due to bad debts, the KDP meeting was told that a detailed audit of the bank was nearing completion. After the audit report was submitted to the Government, penal action would be initiated.

Officials of the cooperative department said if the recovery was more than Rs. 1 crore, there was a possibility of the bank returning a part of the deposits.

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