For a district where generally funds meant for women’s welfare and under ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ scheme were either left unspent or diverted for other purposes, the Sirmaur district’s scrutiny of the centrally sponsored scheme has yielded desired results.

Sirmaur district of Himachal Pradesh has now beaten past trend of skewed sex ratio and has recorded a sex ratio of 1004 girls for every 1000 boys in 2018-19 as compared to 931 in 2011 census.

In May 2018, the district administration, peeved over the repeated occurrence of gender discrimination incidents, had decided to strictly monitor the implementation of schemes meant for girls and women, especially ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ scheme.

Sirmaur Deputy Commissioner Lalit Jain said several initiatives were started in 2018 for improving upon child sex ratio in the district and this has brought desired results.

“The district recorded child sex ratio of 1004 girls for every 1000 boys which is big achievement for the district,” he said, adding now sex ratio in the district has increased to 963 in 2018-19.

It was observed during the review of various schemes that various grants allotted to the panchayats and other officials for the welfare of women weren’t utilized properly.

Further, despite the various initiatives for promoting girl child and ending gender bias, the incidents of discrimination against the fairer sex hadn’t stopped in a geographically tough area.

All the panchayats were directed to ensure that the girl child is not discriminated against or otherwise the grant under ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ scheme would be stopped.

The strictures have resulted in Paonta Block recording birth of 1588 girls against 1509 boys, 634 girls against 602 boys in Sangrah block and 656 girls against 652 boys in Nahan block.

However, there was a significant improvement in the sex ratio in other three blocks of Rajgarh, Shillai and Pachad though these blocks failed to match the rise in other blocks.

The Rajgarh block recorded the birth of 315 girls against 372 boys, 530 girls against 563 boys in Shillai and 359 against 376 boys in Pachad.

Jain said the administration has started plantation drive wherein a tree is planted on the birth of the girl child in the village and the tree would bear the name of the girl on a metal plaque.

A letter signed by the Deputy Commissioner is also sent to the mother (which would be addressed to the child as well) of the girl child, telling her to celebrate the birth every year.

In addition, a gift and a fixed deposit of Rs 11,000 under government scheme are also provided to the family by the district administration.

“We are now planning to award and honour top 20 panchayats of the district where sex ratio has witnessed significant rise during last year,” Jain told The Statesman.

All Sub Divisional Magistrates have been asked to monitor and inspect clinics in their respective areas to curb the practice of prenatal tests, if any, to further improve sex ratio, he added.