In a first-of-its-kind project in the country, the Maharashtra government has developed a website-based migration tracking system (MTS) application to map the movement of vulnerable seasonal migrant workers through individual unique identity numbers.

What is MTS Project?

• The MTS project is envisaged to maintain the continuity of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) like nutrition supply, immunisation and health check-up etc. to migrant beneficiaries.
• It is targeted for children aged up to 18 years, lactating mothers and pregnant women registered with the Anganwadi centres.
• Their migration will be tracked for ensuring the portability of the ICDS for their families in their destination districts within or outside the state until their return to their native places.

Need for such a project

• Distress-driven seasonal migration of workers is quite prevalent in Maharashtra.
• Due to lockdowns, a large number of women and children had got displaced and missed on their nutrition, vaccination and other services under the ICDS scheme.
• Like other states, does not have any institutionalized mechanism to enumerate it.
• So, through this initiative, the state has sought to capture the data of intra-district, inter-districts and interstate migration of such workers.

Working details of the project

• Anganwadi workers have to first register the migrating beneficiaries from their areas on the MTS website app on their laptops or mobile phones by using the workers’ identity cards like Aadhaar, PAN card, or ration cards etc.
• Other than names, the Anganwadi workers have to mention the age, weight, and height of the migrant children, who will be placed in nutritional categories like severe, moderate or acute.
• Depending on this data, the nutrition benefits will be allocated to the children in their new locations.
• On the MTS app, the Anganwadi workers would also collect details about various informal sectors — such as brick kilns, agriculture labour, stone crushing, construction work, sugarcane cutting or sugar factory — where the migrant workers are headed along with their children.

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