Govt. to monitor NGOs closely

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, APRIL 19. The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment is further strengthening the mechanism to monitor the functioning of the Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) which receive grants from the Central Government.

Announcing this during a meeting of the Consultative Committee of the Parliament today, the Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment, Ms. Maneka Gandhi, said the exercise was to ensure that the public money was not misutilised and that optimum benefits accrued to the target groups from the resources being provided to the voluntary organisations.

Ms. Gandhi said a special training programme was being launched for the officers of the Ministry and the retired senior officers of proven integrity from Government services, including the Army before assigning the task to them. The first training programme would be taken up shortly.

She also Informed the Consultative Committee members that her Ministry had extended support to 80 NGOs last year under the Integrated Programme for Street Children to help prevent destitution of children and facilitate their withdrawal from life on streets. For such projects, the Centre provided up to 90 per cent of the cost of the project to the State Government, local bodies, educational institutions and NGOs. The Ministry had released a grant of Rs. 7.33 crores under this scheme during the year 200-2001.

The Ministry had also taken an initiative for an experiment to build partnerships for the agencies which can make a significant impact on promotion of Child's Right under the National Initiative for Child Protection. The aim of the campaign was to train the functionaries in various departments including police, health care, judiciary, education, transport, labour, media and telecommunications as well as elected representatives and members of the community for a better understanding of the child.

The 24-hour free telephone Child Line Service to save children from neglect, abuse and exploitation had been extended to 22 cities and eight more would be added by the end of this year.

The Ministry had already undertaken steps to streamline the process of in-country and intra-country adoption. The Central Adoption Resource Agency (CARA) established for the purpose of regulating the adoptions was facilitating systematic adoption. The time consumed in processing the requests for adoption has been cut-down from two months to 10 days. A record number of 1870 in country and 1360 intra-country adoptions were facilitated by the CARA in the year 2000, Ms. Gandhi said.

The Secretary, Social Justice and Empowerment, Mrs. Asha Das, said the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000, had been enforced from this month. The law is much more children-friendly and lays special emphasis on rehabilitation and social integration of the children through various alternatives such as adoption, foster care and sponsorship, Mrs. Das added.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : National
Previous : Medha Patkar's charges against Narmada basin
           States
Next     : Power regulator comes under fire