Aarogya Lakshmi scheme provides nutritious and healthy meals to all pregnant and lactating mothers registered in Anganwadi Centres. The funding for this scheme as per Government of India norms is a 50:50 split between the Central and State Government. However, in the interest of womens’ health and welfare, the Government of Telangana has enhanced the rates by providing an additional allocation of Rs. 14 per beneficiary per day to the existing GOI cost norms.
This has increased the number of days the beneficiaries receive milk and eggs from 25 to 30. Under this scheme, all pregnant and lactating mothers get one full nutritious meal (containing rice, dal, green leafy vegetables) for 25 days and 200 ml milk and one egg for 30 days each month. Along with this, they are also administered Iron and Folic Acid tablets for 100 days during pregnancy.
As the Anganwadi centers were closed during the lockdown due to COVID-19, supplementary nutrition was given through take home ration (THR), ensuring beneficiaries’ nutrition is not compromised. In addition to the meal, the pregnant mothers are also administered IFA supplementation every day. The IFA tablets are offered on-site, so that the mothers do not forget to take them alongside their meals. In 2021- 22 the scheme benefited over 22,00,346 pregnant, lactating women and children in the age group of 7 months to 6 years (covered under Balamrutham and Supplementary Nutrition Programme).
The pandemic year 2020-21 witnessed an enhanced coverage of 18.24% beneficiaries indicating effective outreach of the Government to the last mile mother and child in need.
