Swasth Bharat Prerak Programme
Implementation partner to support the National Nutrition Mission
The Swasth Bharat Prerak (SBP) programme, launched in January 2018, is a joint initiative of the Ministry of Women & Child Development and the Tata Trusts. It supplements the path-breaking POSHAN (Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment) Abhiyaan or the National Nutrition Mission (NNM) by providing managerial and administrative support to the district and state administration for the effective implementation of the mission.
This programme is modelled on the Zila Swachh Bharat Prerak programme, a first-of-its kind partnership between Tata Trusts and the Government of India that has helped drive the nation’s sanitation mission successfully over the past year.
The main objectives of the SBP programme are:
- Providing an efficient resource at the district level — the Prerak — who works as a catalyst for effective and efficient implementation of the Abhiyaan components.
- Supporting the district magistrate and key officials to mitigate bottlenecks around key nutrition services.
- Providing young men and women an opportunity to contribute to nation-building.
Currently, 346 Preraks are placed across 27 states and 6 union territories in India.
Some of the key achievements of this programme are:
- Contribution by Preraks to the National Nutrition Month, or the Poshan Maah (September 2018) – The ‘4 Hafte 4 Charche’ campaign was launched during the Poshan Maah, and was supported by the Preraks. The four weeks of Poshan Maah helped provide four messages to key stakeholder groups by 200+ Preraks on ground. The stakeholders included the panchayat sarpanches, adolescent girls, women self-help groups (SHGs), pregnant women and nursing mothers.
- Jan Andolan at Kumbh Mela report (February 2019) – The Preraks in UP used the Kumbh Mela as a platform and orchestrated a record-breaking 100 nukkad nataks in 24 hours to create awareness about the importance of nutrition.
- Hands-on support in celebrating the first anniversary of POSHAN Abhiyaan (8-22 March 2019) - The first anniversary celebration of the Mission witnessed large scale participation by Preraks in communication and behaviour-change activities. The Preraks directly facilitated over 2721 activities across 306 districts. These included the Poshan mela, cycle and Poshan rallies, school-based activities, awareness campaigns for adolescent girls, youth group meetings, haat bazaar activities, prabhat pherees and many more. A team of eight zonal leaders from amongst the Preraks actively provided regular content for the Ministry of Women and Child Development’s Facebook and Twitter handles, and have contributed in achieving over five lakh mentions for #PoshanPakhwada.
