Who would have thought Moringa, found
primarily in the rural region, would be used as an effective weapon against
malnutrition? Commonly known as sahjan,
munga and drumstick, its leaves, stems, roots and resins are all useful.
Moringa’s leaves are high in vitamins,
calcium and phosphorus. Now severely malnourished children will benefit from
moringa leaves. In Uttar Pradesh, the Woman and Child Welfare Department is
planting moringa trees. The houses wherein reside severely malnourished children are provided amply with moringa trees. Similar schemes are being executed
in Madhya Pradesh as well.
Woman and Child Welfare Department has
begun the initiative to combat malnourishment through moringa plant at the district
level wherein every house in the district having a severely malnourished child
would be provided with a moringa tree to be planted at its doorstep. Anganwadi
workers shall supervise the planting of the tree.
Numerous researches have proven the
effectiveness of moringa against deadly diseases like cancer. Moringa has
several types of anti-cancer compounds including Kaempferol, rhamnetin, iso-Quercetin
etc. Backed by the modern sciences many ongoing researches are engaged in the
deep study of the anti-cancer properties of moringa.
Herbal expert Deepak Acharya said: “Popularly
known as drumsticks in English, this plant’s pods are an important part of the
south Indian dishes. It is believed that when cooked with other vegetables and
lentils they improve their taste and add their medicinal quality to benefit the
health.”
He added: “Moringa is called munga in Central India. This tree found
in African and Asian countries has edible pods, leaves, flowers, roots and even
bark used in cooking, but people also used them for medicinal purposes.”
The State Nutrition Mission’s 2018
report estimated the number of malnourished children in Uttar Pradesh to be well
above 50 lakh with Azamgarh having the highest number. Shahjahanpur had the
second-highest number of malnourished kids.
As per the statistics and analysis of
National Family Health Survey 2015-16 (NFHS 4), only 1 child out 10 in India
gets adequate nutrition between 6-24 months of age due to which 35.7% of kids
below 5 years of age weigh below normal. At the same time, UNICEF suggests that
breastfeeding for the first year of birth can prevent about 20% of deaths among
children aged below five years.
Gorakhpur’s District Program Officer
(DPO) Hemant Kumar Singh said: “Not only Moringa pods but also the leaves of
the tree are abundant in nutritive components. They have all the nutritive
elements found in fruits such as apple, banana or orange. Becoming aware of the
medicinal properties of the moringa tree, farmers from several states have
taken to its cultivation.
Parents of severely malnourished
children can feed them ground moringa leaves mixed with a nutritious meal. This
will alleviate the condition of malnutrition. NGO Seva Marg’s expert, HK Sharma had trained the CDPOs from the entire
district in the nutritional aspect of moringa, only a couple of days ago.”
Moringa’s pods can also be used for
water purification as it has nine unique amino-acids, 27 different vitamins, about
46 antioxidants besides numerous minerals. It is interesting to note that Gond and Bharia tribes in Kareyam village of Patalkot, put pods of moringa
and few basil leaves in their drinking water in order to purify it. After 2-3
hours they sieve the topwater so gathered and use it for the drinking purpose.
Dr Ram Manohar Lohia Institute’s
gynaecologist, Dr Neetu told Gaon Connection: “Moringa is replete with vitamins.
Besides this, it has other vital nutritive components. Moringa pods or leaves can
be used to curb malnutrition. Pregnant women can benefit immensely from
including it in their diet. Besides malnutrition moringa also helps combat environmental
issues.”
