Thoubal receives JRD Tata Memorial Award

Manipur Information Centre
NEW DELHI , Agust1: Thoubal District was among six districts which received the 5th JRD Tata Memorial Award at a solemn function held at Indian Habitat Centre here today for outstanding performance in improving the health of their people in recent past. The Deputy Commissioner of Thoubal District K. Radhakumar received the award instituted by the Population Foundation of India, New Delhi from the Nobel Laureate and renowned economist Prof. Amartya Sen.

Two states – Mizoram and Goa also received the 5th JRD Tata Memorial Award in the State category. While Mizoram was selected from among 18 high-focus states, defined under the National Rural Health Mission as states with poor health indicators and weak infrastructure, Goa lead from among the non high-focus states.
The districts - Varanasi from Uttar Pradesh, Jajpur from Odisha and Thoubal from Manipur, were selected among high-focus states in the large, medium and small population categories respectively; and Ahmadnagar in Maharashtra, Firozpur in Punjab and North Goa in Goa from the non high-focus states in the large, medium and small population categories. The award, instituted by the Population Foundation of India (PFI), in memory of its Founder Chairman JRD Tata, recognizes the pace of progress by states and districts on population and reproductive health programmes.
The award constituted a trophy and prize money. The ceremony marked the completion of 40 years of PFI’s commitment to improving the health and well being of Indian families in unserved and underserved areas. Prof Sen also delivered the 12thJRD Tata Oration, Women and Other People on the issue of sex ratios. Child sex ratio was one of the 13 indicators on which the progress of the districts was measured.
PFI had set up a high-level technical committee constituting medical and social scientists chaired by Prof P.M.Kulkarni of the Jawaharlal Nehru University to select the winners. The committee identified a set of 13 indicators on reproductive health, gender equity, family planning and housing amenities to measure the progress of the districts in the country. Data from two rounds of District Level Household Surveys, DLHS 2002-04 and DLHS 2007-08, and the Census of 2001 and 2011 was analysed to measure the progress. The combined performance of the districts was taken into account while selecting the states for the awards.

The indicators on which the performance of the districts has been judged are – access to improved sources of drinking water, households with toilet facility, women in the 20-24 year age group who were married before 18 years, women with birth order three and above, current users of spacing methods of family planning, unmet need for contraception, full antenatal care, safe delivery, postnatal care within 48 hours after delivery, full immunization of children (12 - 23 months), female literacy rate, ratio of females to males with primary education and child sex ratio.

Among the noteworthy changes – Ahmadnagar recorded an increase from 20.4 per cent to 87 per cent of children fully immunized between DLHS- 2 to DLHS -3, while Jajpur saw an increase from 35.1 per cent to 83.1 per cent on the same indicator. In Firozpur women marrying before 18 years fell from 40.6 per cent in DLHS-2 to 16.3 per cent in DLHS-3. Varanasi saw a fall in the proportion of women with births of order three and above, from 52.8 per cent to 18.8 per cent for the same period. Thoubal reduced the unmet need for contraceptives among women from 70.7 per cent in DLHS 2 to 23.4 per cent in DLHS-3 and women having safe delivery improved from 55 per cent to 84.4 per cent. North Goa achieved full antenatal care for 93.7 per cent of its women, a straight jump from 46.7 per cent in DLHS 2, the highest figure among all Indian districts.

While child sex ratio fell further across the country between Census 2001 and 2011, Ferozpur bucked the trend and showed a 63 point increase in the proportion of girls raising the figure from 822 to 885 per 1000 boys.

Mizoram received a trophy and a cheque for Rs 15 lakh, while Goa received a trophy and a cheque for Rs 10 lakh. Each of the award-winning districts was presented with a trophy and a cheque of Rs 2 lakh. The cash was given for strengthening NGOs working on reproductive and child health, and population related programmes.