IMPHAL, April 15: Expressing grave concern against the authorities’ failure to pay their honorarium since a long time, the Imphal City Aanganwadi Workers and Helpers today staged sit in protests in various Imphal areas demanding immediate release of their pending monthly honorariums.
Speaking to media persons at one of the protest site at Lizard Library in Wangkhei, an anganwadi worker Lakshmi claimed they haven’t been provided their monthly honorarium for the past eight months.
She said that the workers were facing problems due to non-payment and it is getting hard for them to meet both ends due to the sky rocketing prices of essential commodities.
Lakshmi also demanded that good supplements and nutritious food items should be provided so that the workers and helpers don’t suffer from shortage of such items.
The protestors further claimed that the authorities have failed to adopt a common procedure to supply such items for all districts.
It may be mentioned that the Social Welfare department is the nodal department for implementation of supplementary nutrition programme in the State.
Supplementary Nutrition Programme is provided to children below 6 years of age, pregnant and nursing mothers and adolescent girls of low income group to improve their health and nutritional status.
The scheme is implemented through the network of Anganwadi workers under the Integrated Child Development Service (ICDS) programme.
Similar protests were also held at Singjamei, Keishampat, Thangmeiband, Sagolband and many other places in Imphal.
The anganwadi workers and helpers threatened to launch strong form of agitations if the concerned authority failed to translate their demands at the earliest.