The Government of India launched the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) mainly to strengthen health services in the rural areas. It seeks to provide effective health care to the rural population by improving access, enabling community ownership, strengthening public health systems, enhancing accountability and promoting decentralization (Ministry of Health & Family Welfare 2005). Under the NRHM, there is a specific scheme, the Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY), which was introduced in April 2005. The main objective of JSY scheme is reducing Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) and Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) by encouraging institutional deliveries, particularly in Below Poverty Line families. The paper intends to study the impact of Janani Suraksha Yojana on institutional delivery and Infant Mortality rate. The results show that before implementation of JSY the rate of institutional delivery was less and IMR was high. But after the implementation of JSY the number of institutional deliveries has increased and infant mortality rate has reduced significantly. Finally, it can be concluded that NRHM launched by Government of India holds great hopes and promises to serve the deprived undeserved communities of rural areas. If Government improves the awareness on Janani Suraksha Yojana then there is no doubt that Karnataka can increase its institutional delivery and reduce infant mortality rate.
Institutional Delivery, Infant Mortality Rate, Janani Suraksha Yojana and Karnataka
