Nine out of 10 demands raised by anganwadi workers have already been addressed, says Minister Sandhya Rani

Minister for Women and Child Welfare and Tribal Welfare Gummidi Sandhya Rani on Thursday (March 05) said the government had already addressed nine out of the 10 demands raised by anganwadi workers.

Responding to a query raised in the Assembly by members P. Ramesh Babu and Mohammed Nazeer regarding the functioning and infrastructure of anganwadi centres in the State, the Minister said as part of extending support to anganwadi staff, their salaries were increased from ₹4,200 to ₹7,000 and later, to ₹10,500 in 2018 and ₹15,000 assistance was provided towards funeral expenses for the deceased staff. “The 2025 budget has also allocated ₹20 crore to resolve their long-pending issues,” she said.

She informed the House that out of the 55,746 anganwadi centres currently operating across 257 Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) projects in Andhra Pradesh, 21,756 centres function in their own buildings, 10,566 operate in other government buildings, and 23,424 run in rented premises. She said 2,922 anganwadi buildings are under construction at various stages, including 948 at the finishing stage, 873 at slab level, 351 at roof level, 269 at lintel stage, 429 at basement stage and 52 buildings at foundation stage.

She said proposals worth ₹193.92 crore were under consideration to complete these buildings, including ₹48.52 crore for those in the final stage. The government had already released ₹4 crore in 2025–26 to complete buildings nearing completion and under the PM-JANMAN scheme, ₹9.36 crore had been released for the construction of 78 anganwadi buildings in Srikakulam, Parvathipuram and Alluri Sitarama Raju districts, she informed, adding that additional funds of ₹4 crore had also been released for completing pending buildings and ₹1.94 crore for completed structures.

The Minister said anganwadi centres provided nutritious food, pre-school education and health check-ups to children below six years of age, pregnant women and lactating mothers. To strengthen monitoring and service delivery, the government had distributed 5G smartphones worth ₹75 crore to 58,204 anganwadi workers, supervisors and block coordinators. She said attendance at anganwadi centres had increased from 70% to 96%, which she attributed to the current coalition government’s initiatives.

Ms. Sandhya Rani said the government was currently conducting growth monitoring for nearly 30 lakh children every month, using a mobile app-based system for 100% real-time data entry to track supply and utilisation and that 15 varieties of nutritious food items, including eggs, milk and nutrition mixes such as Balamrutham, were being distributed regularly.