Project Prayatn is situated in one of the remotest

districts of
Rajasthan with historically marginalized
community. Access, unavailability of basic amenities
and discrimination are some of the key factors leading
to the many issues faced by the people. Sharing below
the some of the ground realities in the project and the
work CRY is doing towards bringing about a change
that is sustainable.

Project PRAYATN
Location: 30 villages in
Shahbad block of Baran
district, Rajasthan
Key Issues: Food
insecurity, geographical
isolation, lack of adequate
health facilities, extreme
poverty, inappropriate
development schemes

CRY supported project Prayatn is working in 30

villages/hamlets of the Shahbad block of Baran district
in Rajasthan. The project is working with one of the
most primitive tribes called Sahariya. The villages are Focus Areas for 2015-16
covered by thick degraded forests and small rivers
27 ICDS centers
criss-cross the blocks making transportation and
32 Maa badi centers
communication extremely difficult. In fact some of the
1 MTC
villages are still not connected by road. The community
Growth monitoring
is economically impoverished as they are landless and
of all children in
ages 0-6years
socially recluse. The district has been designated as

Linking of all
food insecure by the government. Owing to the
geographical isolation there is lack of food supply and adequate healthcare facilities
which make the community immensely prone to malnutrition. Children are the most
affected with hardly any development opportunities owing to extreme poverty,
exclusion, food insecurity and inappropriate development schemes.
While there are 19 Aanganwadi centers and 8 mini Aanganwadi canters running in
the area with approximately 1700 children enrolled, the study conducted by the
team at project Prayatn revealed that around 1900 children are eligible for
enrollment and this difference of 200 children indicates that 15% of children from
Saharia community are still not enrolled in the Aanganwadi canters. The growth
monitoring conducted by the team reflected 143 cases of Severely Acute
Malnourished children (SAM) and 240 cases of Moderately Acute Malnourished
children (MAM). Out of these 101 cases have been referred to MTCs and several
SAM cases have been followed at family level. The community based malnutrition
management approach as well as the referral to MTCs has ensured that 15 SAM
children are brought back to normal category.
But there is still a lot of ground to be covered before we ensure child rights. In the
coming year some of the major areas of focus will be growth monitoring of all
children in the age of 0-6 years across all 30 villages, linking all children in the age
of 0-6 years to ICDS center, activation of 27 ICDS centers, 32 Maa-Badis and 1 MTC
in the intervention area, And all this with a focus on reducing the infant and child
deaths in the area and improving the overall well being of children.