“Please listen to me, Amina Bi. You are the only one left in your locality who did not take the dose. Wait, I am connecting your neighbour Farah over a phone call to dispel your doubts.” This recent conversation took place not on a visit between acquaintances but at a health and wellness centre in UP’s Sitapur district. It was how the speaker, Onkar Prasad Gupta, finally succeeded in driving home the importance of a ‘tetanus tika’ during pregnancy to a group of women.
It’s a drill that he repeats on the first Wednesday of every month, the day fixed for administering essential vaccines to pregnant women. The impact he’s able to achieve is immediate and visible in Biswan block, one of the most backward in the state, underlining the value of a recent experiment in service delivery launched by UP govt. For Onkar is a UP chief minister fellow, part of a posse of professionals placed in the 108 most backward blocks in the state with the target of raising the bar of govt welfare services. Onkar’s job is to gradually cover the entire population in the 112 gram sabhas in Biswan to ensure that the vulnerable ones are not excluded from govt services.
