The Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao scheme has been touted as a unique initiative for dealing proactively with discrimination against the girl child. As three years of the scheme draw to a close, three clear lacunae hamper on-ground implementation: (i) inefficient allocation and release of funds, with a cumulative shortfall of INR 77 crores between 2014-15 and 2017-18; (ii) insufficient monitoring and oversight, particularly at district level; and (iii) unbalanced expenditure patterns such that 47% of expenditure was on communication-related activities, vs. just 5% on education.

In this context, it is paramount for national, state and district level task forces to assume the overall responsibility for scheme’s implementation. This article outlines five key recommendations for strengthening the scheme’s implementation: (i) increase planned expenditure allocation for education and health; (ii) ensure district-level task forces are headed by local female frontline workers; (iii) ensure that on-ground implementation personnel are adequately trained; (iv) incentivise public-private partnerships for community-level activities; and (v) necessitate greater use of mobiles for monitoring and documentation.

Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao – the intention and motivation

India stands 108th amongst 149 countries on the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index 2018, lowest amongst the BRICS economies.[1] India’s child sex ratio[2] (CSR) has shown a sharp, consistent decline – with CSR falling from 976 in 1961 to an all-time low of 918 in 2011. Further, while educational outcomes for women have improved, these have not been accompanied by greater participation of women in the labour force, which actually worsened from 34% in 2004-05 to 27% in 2011-12.

In this scenario, the Government of India introduced a flagship initiative namely Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (BBBP) in October 2014, with the primary objective of addressing the issue of declining CSR and focussing on girls’ education as a tool of empowerment. Several quantitative monitorable targets were set, including: (a) increase the sex ratio at birth in gender-critical districts by 10 points on an annual basis; and (b) improve girls’ enrolment in secondary education from 76% in 2013-14 to 79% by 2017. Essentially, the scheme involves two major components:

  1. A nation-wide mass communication campaign to increase awareness;
  2. Multi-sector interventions at district level with the aim of improving education and health outcomes for the girl child.

Critical review of implementation challenges

Following its launch, BBBP has grown in size and scope, from an initial pilot in 100 districts extending to all 640 districts in March 2018. Data released by the Government for the first 161 BBBP districts for the 2015-2017 period shows: (i) improving trend in Sex Ratio at Birth (SRB) in 104 districts; (ii) 119 districts showing progress in first trimester registration against the reported Anti-Natal Care registrations; and (iii) 146 districts reporting improvement in institutional deliveries.[3] Some of the key community-level interventions taking place include display of birth statistics on digital boards, local champions spreading awareness at community level and school enrolment drives. However, there are three clear lacunae in implementation which have been highlighted through a series of audit reports by the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG): (i) inefficient allocation and release of funds at State level; (ii) insufficient monitoring and oversight of community-level activities by district-level task forces and (iii) excessive expenditure on communication-related activities, vis-à-vis multisector interventions focussed on education and health.

  1. Inefficient allocation and release of funds

Over the 2014-15 to 2017-18 period, a total sum of INR 368 crores was allocated to the BBBP scheme, of which INR 291 crores was released. It should be noted that more than half of this cumulative sum, i.e. about INR 200 crores was allocated, and INR 162.4 was released in 2017-18 itself, i.e. in a single year.[4]  This increased allocation and release of funds from the Centre came following a report by the C&AG which criticized the scheme’s implementation noting that less than 20% of the total funds released by the Centre had actually been spent at State level in 2016-17.[5]

Source: http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=178433

  1. Implementation challenges – cases of Haryana and Punjab

The scheme is being implemented with an inter-disciplinary approach. At the national level, the responsibility is shared by the Ministry for Women and Child Development (MoWCD); the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), and the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MoHRD). At the State level, the respective departments are responsible for co-ordination and implementation of the scheme. District Collectors are meant to lead and coordinate actions of all departments for implementation of BBBP at the district level. Most importantly, a task force is mandatory to monitor the scheme’s progress at all three levels – national, state and district.

The C&AG reports for Haryana and Punjab noted several challenges with the implementation of BBBP, ranging from underutilisation of available funds, to lackadaisical implementation and failure of monitoring mechanisms, particularly at State and district level. These are summarised in the table below.[6]

 

Implementation challenge Haryana Punjab
Underutilisation of funds Over the period January 2015-March 2016, GOI released INR 8.08 crores and State government was able to spend INR 5.31 crores Over the period 2014-16, INR 6.36 crores released by GOI, of which INR 0.91 crores utilised upto March 2016.
Infrequent task force meetings Scheme being implemented in 20 districts, and three districts were audited. Only one meeting was held at State level, and none at district level between January 2015 and March 2016, as against a requirement of quarterly meetings. Scheme being implemented in 20 districts. Infrequent task force meetings adversely affected implementation in 11 districts, while scheme could not take off in another 9 districts.
Non-compliance to guidelines Scrutiny of rewards showed that as against target of Rs. 15 lakh to be awarded to schools for the three districts surveyed, only Rs. 1 lakh was awarded in total during 2015-16. Monthly progress reports, statements of expenditures and reports of district / block level task forces not prepared / delayed.

Source: C&AG reports

 

  1. Unbalanced expenditure patterns

A review of the component-wise distribution of expenditure for 2017-18, as well as planned expenditure profile for 2018-19 and 2019-20 suggests that a majority of the expenditure, i.e. about 43% on average, is allocated for media campaigns at the national level, with another 4% for campaigns at district level. Another 27% of expenditure is allocated for community-level activities at district level including community outreach, and providing awareness kits to Anganwadi centres. However, only a small proportion, i.e. about 5% each, is allocated for education and health-related interventions. Further, another 5% is allocated for training and capacity building at the district level, with training at the central level receiving only 1%. This profile of expenditure planned for the next three years is highly skewed towards just one pillar of the BBBP scheme, and makes little provision for strengthening long term, measurable outcomes related to education and health envisaged under the scheme.

Source: Ministry of Women and Child Development. February 2018. Implementation guidelines for State governments / UT administrations.

Recommendations to strengthen BBBP implementation

Taken together, the implementation challenges outlined above are symptomatic of systemic constraints at the State and District levels, including inadequately trained capacity, and a lack of comprehension of specific activities which need to be undertaken at community level. Further, the focus of the scheme itself needs to be reviewed – so as to attain better balance between the two pillars of the scheme. Most importantly, the national, state and district level task forces must assume the overall responsibility for scheme’s implementation at each level, and be held accountable for successes and failures. Therefore, five key recommendations to achieve these objectives are as follows:

  1. Increase planned expenditure allocation for education and health related interventions.

While it is certainly essential to undertake media campaigns and community outreach activities for changing societal attitudes, these activities need to be balanced with the remaining objectives of the scheme, particularly of increasing female school enrolment and attendance, ensuring improvement in girls’ nutrition status, and enhancing girls’ access to improved sanitation facilities. Therefore, there is a need to increase allocations for education and health related interventions, as opposed to solely focussing on awareness related activities. Further, state task forces should be empowered to plan expenditures in consultation with district task forces, responding to local needs.

  1. District level task forces should be headed by local female frontline workers

The BBBP scheme has always been envisioned as a community driven scheme. In order to truly achieve this objective, as well as to create strong, identifiable female role models at the local level, it is essential that the district level task forces in charge of scheme implementation be headed senior female frontline workers. In particular, women members of the Panchayat, Anganwadi workers, female health workers, and female school teachers involved in the execution of the BBBP can be suitable candidates for heading the district task forces.

  1. Ensure that on-ground implementation personnel are adequately trained in community outreach activities

The National Task Force should work closely with the National Skill Development Council (NSDC), as well as with respective State level skill development councils to ensure that the personnel in the State level and district level task forces, as well as frontline workers are adequately trained. The NSDC should be directed to start short-term training programmes targeted at government officials for the execution of community outreach, mobilisation, and awareness activities falling under the BBBP scheme. In particular, these training modules should ensure that members of the State and district task forces are able to fully comprehend the BBBP implementation guidelines issued by the MoWCD, and can undertake the detailed documentation and monitoring work in compliance with scheme guidelines.

  1. Incentivise public private partnerships for executing community level activities

Private sector entities, such as local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) should be on-boarded as long-term partners for the execution of community outreach activities. Local NGOs which have a long-term presence and ties in the community, and therefore hold the community’s trust can become invaluable partners for implementation. Further, regular consultations can be held between the private sector partner and district task force to agree upon monthly outreach, education and health activities which need to be executed at community level.

  1. Necessitate greater use of mobile technology for monitoring and documentation

In order to ensure accountability and improvement in services, it is important to monitor and document all activities conducted at the district, block and gram panchayat levels. Mobile technology should be harnessed for this as it enables increased transparency, and reduces scope for data manipulation. Frontline workers should capture project progress through pictures and geotag, as well as timestamp them. Once the pictures and data on implementation are captured, they can be uploaded to a central server which generates an analysis of progress on the field through a live dashboard. The data on the central dashboard can then be audited by internal and external evaluators. It is therefore essential to build capacities of ground-level implementation officials so that they are comfortable with using specialized mobile based applications for real time monitoring of project progress.

Conclusion

 

The Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao scheme was a long overdue intervention to ensure the basic survival of girls in a highly discriminatory environment. However, despite being well-intentioned, it presently risks becoming a toothless scheme wherein its central objective of improving the child sex ratio (CSR) in some of the country’s worst performing districts remains unmet owing to ineffective implementation. Further, evidence from initial evaluation suggests that State and District level task forces have not even managed to convene regularly, let alone actually monitor the quantitative output targets set out in the scheme. Most critically, expenditure of funds earmarked for the scheme has been centered around national level media campaigns, as opposed to community level interventions for improving education and health outcomes.

In order to ensure that the BBBP’s implementation is reoriented towards the right direction, the national, state and district level task forces must assume the overall responsibility for scheme’s implementation at each level, and be held accountable for successes and failures. Five key recommendations to achieve these objectives are as follows: (i) increase planned expenditure allocation for education and health related interventions; (ii) ensure district level task forces are headed by local female frontline workers; (iii) ensure that on-ground implementation personnel are adequately trained in community outreach activities; (iv) incentivise public private partnerships for executing community level activities; (v) necessitate greater use of mobile technology for monitoring and documentation.

[1] World Economic Forum. 2018. Global Gender Gap report. Available at http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GGGR_2018.pdf

[2] Defined as number of girls per 1000 boys between 0-6 years of age.

[3] http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=177109

[4] It should be noted that the scheme was extended at a pan-India level to 640 districts only in March 2018, i.e. after the financial year 2017-18.

[5] https://cag.gov.in/content/haryana-report-1-2017-non-psus-social-general-and-economic-sectors

[6] https://cag.gov.in/sites/default/files/audit_report_files/Report_No_1_of_2017_Non-PSUs_2015-16.pdf

 

(p.s. I was assisted by Ms. Vandita Bhartiya with research for this piece)

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Disclaimer

Views expressed above are the author's own.

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