Govt to launch portal to monitor schemes for children in difficult circumstances

The government will soon launch a portal to provide a unified digital platform for various programmes related to children in difficult circumstances, a senior official said on Friday.

The National Informatics Centre (NIC) will be integrating the portals of ‘TrackChild’ meant for missing children, ‘CARINGS’ meant for adoption, Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS) and Khoya-Paya, a citizen-centric application for missing and sighted children, into a single platform, he said.

The Mission Vatsalya portal will also be used to monitor childcare institutions, the official said, adding all such homes are getting geo-tagged.

Registration of all childcare institutions on the portal will be ensured along with all relevant details, including those about children coming in contact with the juvenile justice system, he said.

”These vulnerable children need to be mapped with government institutions or services so that their care and development can be ensured,” the official said.

The Mission Vatsalya portal will facilitate better monitoring, avoid duplication of work at the grassroots level and provide a single platform for all the stakeholders, leading to better decision or policy-making, optimum use of resources, availability of child protection resource directory and better citizen participation among others.

The portal would be similar to the Poshan tracker, which monitors the nutrition status of children, lactating mothers and pregnant women at Anganwadi centres, the official said.