Bhubaneswar, May 25: The state government today said the deaths of children in the Nagada cluster of villages in Jajpur district last year were not caused by malnutrition, in a reversal from its earlier stand on the issue.
"The children had died because of malaria and chicken pox and not because of malnutrition," women and child development minister Prafulla Samal said today while briefing the media about the achievements of his department. Samal has taken over the department after the recent ministry rejig on May 8.
Nagada had come into the limelight after it was found that at least 19 children had died within six months, allegedly because of malnutrition. The children belonged to the Juang community, a primitive tribe living on the hills.
Nation-wide uproar following the news had prompted chief minister Naveen Patnaik to set up a task force, headed by the revenue divisional commissioner, to oversee the overall development and welfare activities in the backward area.
Last July, Usha Devi, who was the women and child development minister then, had said that the deaths were caused by malnutrition.
However, Jajpur collector Ranjan Kumar Das had said in an affidavit filed in Orissa High Court in April that not a single child in Nagada had died of malnutrition.
When prodded as to whose version was correct, Samal said: "The central team, which had visited the area, found that the deaths were caused by fever and not malnutrition. The Jajpur collector had accompanied the central team to Nagada," he said.
Quoting the findings of the National Family Health Survey - 4, Samal said Odisha had shown outstanding progress in almost all nutrition indicators from 2005-06. "There has been a 25 point decline in infant mortality rate from 2005-06 and it's lower that the national average of 41. In these 10 years, there have also been significant improvement in nutrition indicators, such as underweight children and stunting," he said.
Samal, who also heads the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) department, claimed that this sector had emerged as the second highest employment provider next to agriculture.
