Bengaluru, June 23: The government of Karnataka has identified as many as 52 children that lost their both parents and became orphans during the second wave of Covid-19. More than one thousand children lost at least one parent.
Presiding over a meeting convened to review the measures taken to protect children during the third wave of Covid-19 here on Tuesday, Women & Child Development Minister Shashikala Jolle said the government has implemented bala seva scheme and bala hitaishi scheme for the welfare of such children.
The minister said she held discussions with relatives of such children and kids via video conference and gathered their opinions. Under bala seva scheme, each child would get Rs 3,500 per month and free education. Eligible children would get either a laptop or a tablet. It has been decided to provide a compensation of Rs 1 lakh to girls aged above 21 years.
She said under the bala hitaishi scheme, the government would establish a link between children with a single parent or those lost parents with donors. Parents who don’t have kids would also be allowed to adopt a child legally.
She said Davangere district has five children who lost parents due to other reasons, one child lost both parents due to Covid-19 and 125 children lost either their father or mother. She directed the officials concerned to upload the details of such children on the Bala Swaraj portal.
She said the department is taking all measures to tackle the third wave of Covid-19 that is likely to hit kids. As many as 1,875 children aged below 18 years of age contracted the Covid-19 infection during the first wave. As many as 2,283 children were infected by it during the second wave. But there was no child who was seriously ill.
District Health Officer Nagaraj said the district has seven lakh children aged below 19 years. It is estimated that 10 per cent children may contracted the viral infection during the third wave of Covid-19.
In order to tackle the third wave of Covid-19, 68 pediatricians have been identified in the district. A children's ward with 68 beds will be set up in the district general hospital, while ten beds with oxygen facilities will be set up in each taluk general hospital.
Each taluk will have two covid care centres for children. In total, 2,500 beds for children have been arranged.
A proposal has been submitted to the government seeking 60 ventilators, medicine. Training programmes would be conducted for doctors, asha, anganwadi workers and nurses in the first week of July.
MP G M Siddeshwara promised a 12-year old girl child from Honnali taluk who lost her parents due to Covid-19 that he would bear her higher education expenses.
MLAs Ramachandrappa, SA Raveendranath, Linganna, Zilla Panchayat Executive Officer Vijay Mahantesh, Superintendent of Police C B Rishyanth were present in the meeting.
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