On his birthday on September 17, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch the Swasth Nari, Sashakt Parivar Abhiyaan alongside the eighth edition of Poshan Maah, giving a significant push to women’s health and nutrition across the country. The campaign, described as India’s largest mobilisation drive for women, children, and adolescents, will be implemented jointly by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) and the Ministry of Women and Child Development (MoWCD), with active support from the Ministry of Ayush, state and Union Territory administrations, NGOs, self-help groups, private hospitals, research institutions, and community organisations.
The initiative reflects the Prime Minister’s broader vision of Health, Poshan, Fitness, and a Viksit Bharat by 2047. It has been designed to deliver preventive, promotive, and curative health services to women and children while also strengthening screening and treatment linkages for anaemia, tuberculosis, non-communicable diseases, and sickle cell disease. Beyond treatment, the programme emphasises maternal and child health through antenatal care, immunisation, nutrition counselling, menstrual hygiene awareness, and healthy lifestyle practices such as yoga, improved diets, obesity prevention, and voluntary blood donation.
As part of the campaign, more than one lakh health camps will be organised between September 17 and October 2 across the country. These will be held in Community Health Centres, Ayushman Arogya Mandirs, district hospitals, medical colleges, and Ayush facilities, making it the most extensive health outreach programme in India’s history. Women and children attending these camps will receive access to a wide range of services, including screening for hypertension, diabetes, and obesity, as well as oral cavity checks, clinical breast examinations, demonstrations of self-examination techniques, and cervical cancer screenings. Referral services for mammography, oncology care, and other specialist treatments will also be made available.
Expectant mothers will benefit from comprehensive antenatal care, such as haemoglobin testing, blood pressure monitoring, foetal growth tracking, and counselling on safe pregnancy and institutional deliveries. Children will be covered under growth monitoring and immunisation drives, while mothers will receive Infant and Young Child Feeding counselling and Mother and Child Protection (MCP) cards.
Blood donation drives will be another integral part of the initiative, strengthening trauma care, surgeries, and the treatment of blood disorders. The campaign will also facilitate enrolment of beneficiaries in central government schemes like Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PM-JAY), Ayushman Vaya Vandana, and the Ayushman Bharat Health Account (ABHA). Special helpdesks at health camps will support card verification and grievance redressal.
Specialist medical services will be made available through central institutions such as AIIMS, Defence and Railway hospitals, ESIC facilities, and Institutes of National Importance (INIs). Private hospitals have also pledged support, offering services in gynaecology, paediatrics, eye care, ENT, dermatology, dentistry, and psychiatry. Complementing these, the Ministry of Ayush will promote holistic wellness through yoga sessions, Ayurveda consultations, and traditional therapies.
The mobilisation will see active grassroots participation, with Union and state ministers, Members of Parliament, ASHA and ANM workers, Anganwadi staff, self-help groups, Panchayati Raj Institutions, urban local bodies, and MY Bharat youth volunteers working together to ensure maximum outreach. Several other ministries, including Rural Development, Panchayati Raj, Education, Youth Affairs & Sports, Defence, Railways, Labour & Employment, Heavy Industries, and Social Justice & Empowerment, will contribute, underscoring the government’s whole-of-society approach.
Officials have projected the Swasth Nari, Sashakt Parivar Abhiyaan as a transformative step towards making women’s health a cornerstone of India’s development journey. By integrating healthcare, nutrition, and community mobilisation on an unprecedented scale, the campaign seeks to ensure that healthier women lead to stronger families and, ultimately, a healthier nation, a vision aligned with India’s developmental roadmap for 2047.
