Name: Manish Kumar

Guide: Prof. Raja Mohanty and Prof. Mandar Rane

Course: Visual Communication

Credits: NGO- Jatan Sansthan

Understanding of Maternal Health in Rajsamand, Rajasthan and Wighawali, Maharashtra

In India, thousands of women die of pregnancy-related complications, anemia, and malnutrition. These are easily preventable deaths, requiring only good nutrition and education of basic health care. In large parts of rural and urban India, the public health system lacks basic infrastructure like labor room and blood banks, as well as staff and proper equipment for childbirth. Here an attempt has been made to educate women about pregnancy and maternal health especially in rural areas by providing them pregnancy-related information. The output of the project is in the form of a booklet from which pregnant women could learn what important steps should be taken during her entire pregnancy period. This information is provided in a booklet and a calendar; in the form of images, short poems and instructions.

This booklet is my attempt to guide and spread information about pregnancy and maternal health. Firstly, I observed the life of a pregnant and lactating women with the help of NGO- Jatan Sansthan. After a detailed study on this subject, I gathered information in detail about pregnancy from ladies, doctors, books etc. I came up with appropriate illustrations and content about pregnancy.
I designed illustration and content according to Rajasthan and Maharashtra culture in the form of a booklet. Several alterations were done after testing of the booklet.
Here are some pages from the booklet.

Here are the three alterations of pregnancy booklet. The size of the booklet is kept A5, central pinning binding, offset print considering its mass production with cheap cost.

This is an attempt to find out an alternative solution on maternal health which involves designing, testing, and its documentation. The output is in the form of a pregnancy calendar from which pregnant women could learn, what important steps should be taken during her entire pregnancy period? because the calendar is the common medium of information in rural areas. A calendar is a form which generates clues in which how should one read information. This information is provided in the pregnancy calendar in the form of images, informative poems, and instructions. It is also providing a system for midwives to visit pregnant woman once in a month at least.