Women, child protection meetings infrequent at panchayat level in Karnataka

The irregularities in the frequency of women and child protection meetings at the gram panchayat level were noticed last year with around 47 per cent of meetings held across the state. In Bangalore city, only 10 were held instead of the expected 315 meetings. Across Karnataka, 8,580 were held as expected to 18,069.

Speaking about the infrequency, Uma Mahadevan, additional chief secretary, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Department (RDPRD) said, the meeting was held as and when they were conducted and convened, further due to the pandemic, the panchayat was actively working towards it and to avoid large gatherings, meetings might have been avoided. A lag in updating data on the portal could be another reason for the infrequency, she added.

A digital platform 'Panchtantra' is in the pipeline to be adopted for managing and updating meeting statuses in a more convenient way, she further added.

Kripa MM, coordinator for Concerned for Working Children explained that the initiatives put forward by the government were good but lacked in implementation. She added that the convergent plan was not efficiently working at the grass-root level, the departments were working stand-alone and not together. Many circulars and schemes have been issued but their implementation is almost negligible.

She also suggested that the capacity building of gram panchayat members should be decentralized and a convergence plan should be made at the grass-root level and emerge upward from there.

Talking about the importance of such meetings, Uma had said it provides a platform for women and children to raise issues about health, sanitation, trafficking, education, child marriage, woman's safety etc. suggestions or general views related and panchayat members are expected to take necessary actions.