More than 30 Baiga children have reportedly died in Balaghat’s tribal belt. The Baiga community is an indigenous Scheduled Tribe (ST) in central India and is officially classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG).
As a PIL brings the deaths before the Madhya Pradesh High Court, The Better India looks at the healthcare safeguards that are supposed to be available to a Baiga child living in a remote habitation — from Mobile Medical Units and health sub-centres to child screening, vaccination and nutrition services.
The PIL, which raised the deaths of more than 30 children and alleged inadequate medical care, prompted the court on 10 September to issue notices to the state Health Department, the Women and Child Development Department, the Balaghat Collector and other authorities. The petition also claimed that around 400 children were being treated in a hospital with a capacity of only 50 beds.
The court, however, did not accept the petition’s claims at face value.
During the preliminary hearing, the bench observed that a PIL based only on newspaper reports would not be sufficient and directed the petitioner to visit the affected areas, verify the situation and submit a report.
The petitioner subsequently visited the villages, and his report and affidavit were placed before the court.
That report alleged that handpumps in affected areas were producing yellow-coloured water, that children and women had not received nutritious food on time for several months, and that there was widespread filth in the affected areas. The report claimed that only after the death toll crossed 30 did the administration increase hospital beds and step up health, sanitation and cleanliness measures.
The court has sought responses from the authorities, with the next hearing scheduled for 18 September.
Against this backdrop, there is another question worth examining: what healthcare protections is a Baiga child supposed to have on paper?
It started as an unidentified illness
The first reports from Balaghat were about an illness affecting children in tribal-dominated villages of the Birsa development block.
On 12 August, PTI reported that at least seven children had died since the end of June, with symptoms including fever and rashes and, in some cases, kidney-related complications. The affected villages included Adori, Machhurda Panchayat, Bondari and Kundekasa. Blood samples were sent to specialised ICMR laboratories to establish the cause.
By 5 September, PTI reported that 30 tribal children had died. Different organisations may also have used different time periods or geographical boundaries while counting deaths.
Until those records are reconciled, the exact toll remains contested.
The existence of that uncertainty, however, does not erase the larger question of what healthcare provisions are designed to protect children in these remote communities.
There was no single disease
A Union government review has found multiple clinical factors among the cases rather than one pathogen responsible for all the deaths.
These have included measles, malaria, co-infections, respiratory distress, dehydration, malnutrition, anaemia and shock.
Balaghat के उस Tribal village में, जहाँ 30 से ज्यादा बच्चों की मौत हो चुकी है, लोगों को पीने के लिए यही पानी मिल रहा है।
एक सवाल Ministers और MLAs से है—
क्या आप अपने बच्चों को यही पानी पिला सकते हैं?
अगर नहीं, तो फिर इन Tribal बच्चों के लिए यही पानी क्यों?
क्या गरीब और… pic.twitter.com/6brWyIMgGl
— Vijender Chauhan (@masijeevi) September 14, 2026
Officials have also noted that some early deaths occurred at home or before children reached an appropriate medical facility, limiting the availability of medical records and samples.
This makes access to primary healthcare, early screening, nutrition and timely treatment particularly important when examining the safeguards available to children in the affected communities.
Why the Baiga have specific healthcare provisions
The Baiga are not simply a Scheduled Tribe. They are classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group, or PVTG — a category covering tribal communities identified by the government as facing particular socioeconomic and infrastructural vulnerability.
That designation comes with targeted government interventions.
In November 2023, the Union government launched the Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyaya Maha Abhiyan, or PM-JANMAN, specifically for India’s 75 PVTG communities.
The programme seeks to saturate PVTG habitations with basic services including housing, drinking water, roads, electricity, education, nutrition and healthcare.
For healthcare, this is important because many PVTG habitations are located in remote or difficult-to-reach areas.
One of the provisions under the programme is the deployment of Mobile Medical Units (MMUs) to take healthcare closer to such communities.
But PM-JANMAN is only one part of the healthcare system.
1. A health facility closer to tribal populations
Government norms recognise that tribal and difficult areas have different healthcare-access challenges.
A Sub Health Centre in a tribal, hilly or difficult area is intended to serve 3,000 people, compared with 5,000 people in general areas.
These facilities form part of the primary healthcare network and are intended to provide basic healthcare services closer to communities rather than requiring every patient to travel to a larger hospital.
For a child living in a remote Baiga habitation, this is the first layer of the formal healthcare system.
2. Healthcare at the habitation level
The government’s rural health system also relies on frontline workers who connect households with formal health services.
This includes ASHA workers, who serve as a link between communities and the public health system, as well as Anganwadi centres, which play a role in child health, nutrition and early childhood services.
For young children, Anganwadi centres are also linked to health screening under the government’s child-health programme.
This means that the healthcare framework is not designed to begin only when a severely ill child reaches a hospital. It includes services intended to identify health and nutritional problems earlier.
3. Mobile Medical Units for remote villages
PM-JANMAN specifically includes Mobile Medical Units to address the last-mile healthcare challenge in PVTG areas.
The idea is straightforward: where a permanent health facility may be difficult to access, healthcare teams can travel to remote habitations.
In November 2023, the Union government launched the Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyaya Maha Abhiyan, or PM-JANMAN, specifically for India’s 75 PVTG communities. Photograph: (Bhaska English)
During the current Balaghat response, the Centre said six Mobile Medical Units were deployed in Birsa and Baihar to provide screening, outpatient treatment, medicines and maternal and child health services in remote communities.
This is the same model of last-mile healthcare that PM-JANMAN seeks to strengthen for PVTG habitations.
4. Children are supposed to be screened before they become critically ill
India’s Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK) was launched in 2013 to screen children from birth to 18 years for health conditions, deficiencies, diseases and developmental problems and connect them to treatment.
For children up to six years, screening is linked to Anganwadi centres. Older children are covered through mobile health teams.
The programme covers conditions including deficiencies and diseases that can affect a child’s health and development.
In principle, this creates another layer of protection: a child’s health problems are supposed to be identified and referred for treatment before they become severe.
5. Nutrition is part of the healthcare safety net
Nutrition is particularly relevant in the Balaghat situation because malnutrition has emerged as one of the concerns among children in the affected area.
According to Women and Child Development Department data, among 14,259 children assessed in Birsa in August, 551 were classified as severely acutely malnourished and 1,948 as moderately acutely malnourished.
Across Balaghat, the corresponding figures were 3,741 and 15,588.
These numbers do not establish that malnutrition caused the deaths.
They do, however, show why nutrition forms an important part of the child-health system. Government programmes are designed to identify children who are malnourished and provide them with nutritional support and follow-up.
6. Vaccination is another layer of protection
Measles is vaccine-preventable, and India’s Universal Immunisation Programme includes measles-rubella vaccination.
Vaccination has been intensified in Balaghat as part of the response to the current crisis.
According to the Centre’s 5 September account, 14,637 children between one and 10 years had received an additional MR vaccine dose, regardless of their previous vaccination status.
A WHO-led survey in the affected Birsa area reportedly found that while most children had received at least one measles dose, coverage of the second dose was considerably lower.
The vaccination system therefore provides another preventive layer intended to protect children before they become seriously ill.
The Balaghat deaths now place these provisions under scrutiny.
The court is examining the allegations made in the PIL, while authorities have begun responding to the health crisis. The next hearing is scheduled for 18 September.
The question this episode raises is therefore not whether a healthcare framework exists for PVTG communities. It does.
The more difficult questions — including whether every provision was functioning as intended in the affected habitations, and whether children received timely care will form part of the scrutiny now underway.
