Delhi: For newborn girls, initiative to get all key certificates at hospital itself

Additionally, it also aims to get registration for schemes for girl children and mothers such as the Sukanya Samriddhi Account scheme, the Ladli scheme, and Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana done at the hospital itself.

“We want to make processes for schemes as simple as possible for all children and mothers. The idea is providing a one-stop solution so that parents won’t have to go from here to there, trying to avail of essential schemes… We want that schemes should reach the people for whom they are designed… This is also an occasion to celebrate the girl child,” said District Magistrate (Northwest) Cheshta Yadav.

The administration has partnered with Punjab National Bank to ensure an easy process to open a bank account for the child where transfers under the schemes can be made.

Apart from ensuring that schemes reach target beneficiaries and protecting the interests of girl children, the programme also aims to promote institutional deliveries.

“The basic aim of most of these schemes is to protect the birth of the girl child, and to facilitate a safe and secure environment and education for her. The schemes involved are all old, but this ensures that enrolment for many of these is done under one roof… Since this programme starts from the hospital, people will know that with a hospital delivery, they get such and such benefits. It will motivate and promote institutional delivery; that is our main target. That will reduce our maternal mortality rate and infant mortality rate,” said hospital medical superintendent Dr S K Arora.

Apart from Sanjay Gandhi hospital where it was launched on Friday, the programme will also be started in other government hospitals in the district — Bhagwan Mahavir Hospital, Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar Hospital, Deep Chand Bandhu Hospital — from Monday.
Yadav emphasised that parents can also return to the hospital and avail of these services after the mother and child are discharged.

Among the other first beneficiaries of the programme is Suhana, who was born on the evening of June 8. She is visually impaired. Her mother Ruby (20) has already received her birth certificate and Aadhaar enrolment slip but she said she will also need support to learn about and avail schemes for disabled children. Ruby had delivered her first child, her two-year-old son, at home.

“I don’t have any of his documents yet, not even his birth certificate. My husband, who works as a labourer, and I did not know how to get these done but we’ll do it. I came to the hospital this time because I had been really weak and unwell,” she said.

On the other hand, Hipza is a first child. “Main isse bahut padhaaoongi (I will educate her a lot),” said her mother Rihana (25). Along with their documents, the mothers will also take a souvenir back home with them — a framed photo of her with her newborn along with an imprint of the baby’s little foot.