Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Governor Anandiben Patel has adopted a girl child infected with tuberculosis (TB). Following in her footsteps, the staff of Raj Bhawan has adopted 21 other children suffering from TB.
The Governor and other staff members will ensure the children get proper medicine and nutritious food so that they can lead a healthy life.
Patel said it would be the responsibility of the staff concerned to ensure that these children get nutritious food, medicines and proper education. All the children are from an area near the Raj Bhawan and this will make their monitoring easy.
A senior Raj Bhawan official said: "The Governor had suggested that a beginning be made from the area near Raj Bhawan and later spread this protective ring."
The Governor said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set a target to make India TB-free by 2025 and keeping this in mind, the Raj Bhawan had taken the lead and decided to adopt children suffering from TB.
"Adopting a child is not an obligation. It is the responsibility of a person to help a society. Those who are rich should spare some money for these people who need help. These are small steps but can help in achieving a big target," the Governor said.
She added that the government could not reach every nook and corner of the state and it was also the responsibility of the common man to help the poor.
Patel said people of the deprived sections of society could not avail the benefits of government schemes because they did not know about them.
"It is our responsibility to ensure that the benefits of welfare schemes reach the people who need them the most," she said.
District Leprosy Officer Dr P.K. Gupta said that in Lucknow alone, around 14,600 TB patients had been identified and all of them would get Rs 500 as nutrition allowance.