Amidst claims of ‘good governance’ by Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, it has come to light that the Delhi government’s scheme (named ‘Udaan’) of distributing sanitary pads to 30000 out-of-school girls at ₹1 each has been non-operational for the past 2.5 years.
As per an exclusive report by The Hindu, the Delhi government has been unable to fix a new vendor since March 2020 to continue the supply of sanitary pads. The scheme was launched in April 2019 under which an estimated 30000 economically backward girls were to be given a pack of 6 sanitary pads for ₹6.
Initially, the Kejriwal government joined hands with a private company to facilitate the large-scale supply of pads. However, the contract expired in March 2020 and the scheme has been non-operational since then.
Only 60% of the original target was achieved during the pilot run
Former beneficiaries of the scheme have lamented the government’s apathy towards them. The father of a 15-year-old differently-abled girl child, Yogesh Kumar, informed that his family had not received sanitary pads for a long time.
“I spend around 40% of my salary on her medicines and other expenses. Any assistance from the government is very helpful,” she told The Hindu. This is despite the fact that funds for the scheme were originally provided to the Delhi government by the Centre under the Menstrual Hygiene Scheme (MHS).
The objective was to cover 50000 adolescent girls per month and create awareness about hygienic and safe menstrual health practices. However, the Delhi government could reach only 30000 to 35000 girls on average each month during its pilot run from April 2019 to March 2020.
Low-quality pads and restructuring of the Udaan scheme
Even then, several ASHA workers, who were in charge of the distribution, complained about the low quality of the pads. “Some used to complain about the quality of the pads, but families who could not afford to buy sanitary pads still found them useful and used to ask for them,” remarked an ASHA worker named Lakhvinder Kaur.
Having failed at keeping the Udaan scheme operational for the past 30 months (2.5 years), the Arvind Kejriwal government has now decided to re-launch the scheme in a new avatar.
An official told The Hindu that the scheme is now being structured by the Delhi government. Under the new scheme, a total of 10 sanitary pads will be provided every month to 50,000 out-of-school girls and 20,000 female students of government-run schools.
“Also, the government is planning to give free sanitary pads every month to 6,000 ASHA workers and 11,000 anganwadi workers as part of the scheme,” he said.
Delhi govt had stopped supplying sanitary pads to school girls too
This is not the only scheme of sanitary pad supply that the Delhi govt has discontinued. Earlier, the AAP govt had stopped providing pads to high school girls under the scheme named Kishori Yojana. As a result, a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was filed in the Delhi High Court in May this year seeking directions to resume the scheme. The PIL had said that the Education Department of the Delhi govt had stopped supplying sanitary napkins since January 2021. In July, the High Court directed the Delhi govt to resume supplies under the scheme in July this year.
