The latest report of Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) on Friday highlighted the poor implementation of National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) in Bihar, where inadequate antenatal care and shortage of gynaecologists in health centres, prompted half of the pregnant women to opt for home delivery.
The maternal mortality rate was 208 against the targeted rate of 100 out of 1,00,000 pregnant women, said the CAG report for the year 2015, which was presented in the Bihar Assembly by Finance Minister Abdul Bari Siddiqui.
Tej Pratap Yadav, son of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad, is the Health Minister of the state.
The report said antenatal care prescribed by NRHM framework for pregnant women specified that early registration of pregnancy, ideally within first trimester (before 12th week of pregnancy), should be ensured along with minimum three antenatal check ups and supplementation of Iron and Folic Acid (IFA) tablets for at least 100 days.
“The scrutiny of records make it evident that during 2010-15, only 43 per cent to 53 per cent of the pregnant women were registered within first trimester of pregnancy due to shortage of manpower and also lack of tracking by ASHAs,” the report said.
The IFA tablets were provided to only 45-63 per cent of the registered pregnant women due to coverage of large areas under the scheme and unmotivated staff, it observed. “Besides, 57,420 stillbirths were noticed against total institutional delivery of 23,19,252 during 2010-15 in the test checked districts due to shortage of gynaecologists at Health centres," it said.