Janani Suraksha Yojana

A conditional cash-transfer scheme launched by the Government of India in 2005 under the National Rural Health Mission, paying eligible pregnant women a cash incentive for delivering in a government or accredited private health facility rather than at home, along with linked payments to the community health workers (ASHAs) who help arrange institutional delivery. Its goal is to reduce maternal and neonatal mortality by increasing access to skilled birth attendance and emergency obstetric care. The scheme is associated with large increases in institutional delivery rates across India, though researchers have debated how much of that shift translated into proportional reductions in maternal and neonatal deaths, since increased facility use did not always come with matching increases in the quality of care available at those facilities.