World No Tobacco Day
On the occasion to mark the World No Tobacco Day, CUTS CHD organised a seminar at the Centre on May 31, 2006, under the chairmanship of PN Khandelwal. The seminar aimed to discourage the use of tobacco in any form by showing its ill-effects. PN Khandelwal informed the audience that tobacco use is one out of the five leading causes of death and one out of every 10 young men is addicted to tobacco.
According to Khandelwal, “even today, we spend 10 percent of our income on tobacco”. It was further elaborated that smoking is the major cause of heart attack and heart-related diseases, brain haemorrhage and cancer etc. Thus, people were requested not to use tobacco and also discourage others.
Survey on MDMS
Under the Participatory Expenditure Tracking Survey (PETS), project of CUTS CART in partnership with World Bank on Mid-Day Meal Scheme (MDMS), CUTS CHD organised a debriefing meeting at, Chittorgarh, on May 11, 2006. Speaking on the occasion, TC Damor, city Superintendent of Police (SP) said that MDMS is very useful and important to help raise the education level, increase the enrollment rates and improve health and nutrition of children.
Rajendra Singh Shekhawat, District Collector, acknowledged that the survey conducted shows proper implementation of the MDMS, which is a matter of satisfaction. However, its qualitative standard could be enhanced further through increased people’s participation, he added. Sunil Kumar Jha, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Zilla Parishad, Chittorgarh, presented the implementation details of MDMS, and asked for the cooperation of the guardians, people’s representatives and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) for better implementation of the project.
In the introductory session, CUTS’ staff K C Sharma and Dudheshwar Kumar presented the key findings of the survey, such as:
children like Dal Bati (a dish prepared with flour and other ingredients) and 92-95 percent of them do take meal in the schools;
about 72 percent parents agree that education level has increased with the MDMS;
about 77 percent guardians accept that health and nutrition among children have improved; and
67 percent teachers say that due to the responsibility of implementing the project, their teaching work has been adversely affected.