Ahead of Poshan Maah, CM Yogi Adityanath Govt Gives 4 Major Gifts To Anganwadi Workers

Ayodhya, September 8: Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday announced a major gift for the state’s 2.91 lakh Anganwadi workers and helpers. The honorarium for Anganwadi workers will increase from Rs 8,000 to Rs 12,000, while that for helpers will increase from Rs 4,000 to Rs 6,000 per month. Along with this, workers, helpers and their families will get cashless treatment of up to Rs 5 lakh every year. They will now receive three sarees instead of two. CM also announced plans to make Anganwadi centers smart through smartphones and real-time data.

CM Yogi addressed the felicitation ceremony for Anganwadi workers and helpers organized under ICDS at Ayodhya Dham. Around 12,000 Anganwadi workers and helpers were present in Ayodhya, while ministers, MPs, MLAs and Anganwadi workers and helpers joined the programs organized in all 75 districts. Ahead of Poshan Maah, which begins on Wednesday, CM Yogi gave four major gifts to Anganwadi workers and helpers: an increase in honorarium, cashless health facility, an additional saree and smartphones. Before his address, CM inspected stalls from various departments at the exhibition set up at the venue, presented Poshtahar to women, and conducted Annaprashan for several children.

Chief Minister stated that when the government was formed in 2017, Anganwadi workers received an honorarium of merely Rs 3,000. “The government linked it with a performance-based system and increased it to Rs 8,000. Now it will be increased to Rs 12,000.” The honorarium of helpers was also increased from Rs 1,500 to Rs 4,000 earlier and is now being increased to Rs 6,000. Anganwadi workers and helpers played an important role along with ANMs and ASHA workers during the biggest pandemic of the century, COVID-19. They remained engaged, risking their lives, from screening people in villages to the Dastak campaign and serving infected people.

CM Yogi stated, “All Anganwadi workers and helpers, along with their families, will receive a cashless health facility of up to Rs 5 lakh every year.” They can avail this facility at impanelled hospitals, government hospitals, and medical colleges. Recently, the state provided around 15 lakh teachers, Shikshamitras, and instructors with a cashless health facility of Rs 5 lakh. There had been a continuous demand that Anganwadi workers and helpers should also be included in this facility. “Now the government is going to provide this facility to them as well.”

The Chief Minister said funds for sarees have been released for the state’s 2.91 lakh Anganwadi workers and helpers. So far, they have received two sarees. Now, Rs. 500 more will be provided for an additional saree. The state government will bear an additional burden of around Rs. 20 crore. In the first phase, 1.28 lakh smartphones have also been provided. Through these, data related to schemes can be recorded in real time and the work of Anganwadi workers will also become easier.

Linking the role of Anganwadi workers to the future of children, CM stated that Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji compared their role to that of Mata Yashoda in 2018. “After the mother, small children have their first interaction with Anganwadi workers and helpers. If childhood is healthy, India will become healthy, capable, self-reliant and developed.” Over the past 09 years, more than 70,000 Anganwadi centers in the state have been given an organized structure. Government’s goal is to provide its own building to every Anganwadi center. For this, buildings will be constructed through State Finance Commission funds or a separate budget.

Attacking the previous governments, Chief Minister stated, “Before 2017, Anganwadi centers were dilapidated. Children used to bring mats to sit on. There was a lack of drinking water and essential equipment. The Central Government provided the money, but a mafia had a stranglehold on nutritional food. A liquor mafia used to operate the nutritional food for children in the state. Government and mafia used to ruin the system, while Anganwadi workers and helpers had to bear the disrepute.”

“Now, nutritional food has been freed from the mafia, and Take Home Ration plants at 204 locations are being operated through women’s self-help groups.”

Linking the transformation of Ayodhya with the rejuvenation of Anganwadi centers, Chief Minister stated, “Ten years ago, there was neither adequate electricity nor roads nor facilities here. Today, Ayodhya has four-lane roads, a grand railway station and an international airport named after Maharishi Valmiki. The railway’s single line has now become double. Ram Ki Paidi has been rejuvenated and Ayodhya has become the country’s solar city.”

“Both SP and Congress opposed the Ram Temple. SP even opposed widening roads in Ayodhya, the railway station, and the construction of the airport. They are opposed to heritage as well as development. But despite their opposition, neither the Ram Temple campaign stopped nor did the development of Ayodhya. Today, Ramlala is seated in the grand temple and people from the country and the world are witnessing the transformation of Ayodhya.”

At the ceremony, children and their parents who moved from the SAM and MAM categories to normal nutritional status, Anganwadi centers that performed excellently and daughters who participated in the Everest Base Camp campaign were felicitated. On the occasion, Agriculture Minister Surya Pratap Shahi, Women Welfare and Child Development and Poshtahar Minister Baby Rani Maurya, Minister of State for Women Welfare Pratibha Shukla, Ayodhya Mayor Pandit Girishpati Tripathi, District Panchayat Member Roli Singh, Legislative Council Member Hariom Pandey, Ayodhya Sadar MLA Ved Prakash Gupta, Rudauli MLA Ramchandra Yadav, Milkipur MLA Chandrabhanu Paswan, Gosainganj MLA Dr. Amit Singh Chauhan, Abhay Singh, Additional Chief Secretary, Women Welfare and Child Development Department, Leena Johri, and other dignitaries from the state and district were present.

Published on: Tuesday, September 08, 2026, 07:02 PM IST