Poshana Malla: Rs 45,000 Nutrition Allowance Checker

Everything on this page comes from one document: Women and Child Affairs Circular 3/2023, Programme to Provide a Nutrition Allowance of Rs.45,000/- to Pregnant and Lactating Mothers – 2024, issued by the Ministry of Women, Child Affairs and Social Empowerment and effective from 2024-01-01. It cancelled circulars 06/2016 and 07/2022 from the same date, so it is the only rule set that applies to an application made today. The checker reproduces four of its tests and nothing else.

1. The income ceiling

Paragraph 6.1 sets the ceiling by multiplying the current per capita monthly expenditure by the number of people in the family. Paragraph 6.1.1 pins that per capita figure at Rs 38,121, taken from Department of Census and Statistics data, and says the Director of the National Secretariat for Early Childhood Development will notify any revision. Until that notice is issued, the circular figure is the operative one.

ceiling = 38,121 × family members The circular works its own example: three members gives Rs 38,121 × 3 = Rs 114,363. The tool reproduces that figure to the rupee, and cross-checks every family size against a separately hand-multiplied table so a mistyped constant cannot pass silently.

2. The income test

Paragraph 6.1 entitles mothers "of families with a monthly income less than the amount so determined". The wording is less than, not less than or equal to, so a household whose income lands exactly on the ceiling fails. The checker reports that boundary as a fail with a shortfall of Rs 0 rather than rounding it into a pass, because a Grama Niladhari applying the circular will do the same.

3. The medical override

Paragraph 6.2 is the escape hatch. A mother who fails the income test is still entitled, on the recommendation of the relevant Medical Officer of Health, if she has one or more of: Body Mass Index below 18.5 kg/m², anaemia, a multiple pregnancy, or another nutritional deficiency. So the verdict is the income test OR a certified condition, and the tool labels which of the two it used. The override rests on the MOH writing the recommendation, not on the mother's own view of her health.

4. The vouchers and the clock

Paragraph 8.2 fixes the money: one voucher is worth Rs 4,500, 10 are issued at once, and they run for 10 months from the date 12 weeks of pregnancy is completed, covering the last six months of pregnancy and the first four months of breastfeeding. That is 10 × Rs 4,500 = Rs 45,000, which matches the Rs 45,000in the circular's own title.

The clock runs two ways. Paragraph 8.5 asks for the application to reach the Divisional Secretariat before the end of the third month of pregnancy, about week 13. Paragraph 10.3 then voids each voucher once the month stamped on it ends. Together those mean a late application does not lose the entitlement in principle, it just burns whole vouchers, one for every month of delay. The schedule in the tool shows exactly which ones.

The last rule is geographic. Paragraph 7.4 says the issuing office is the Divisional Secretariat of the division where the government maternity clinic is, not where the mother lives. When the two differ, the Grama Niladhari of the residence division forwards an income letter countersigned by that division's Divisional Secretary to the issuing office. The checker adds that step to the route when you say the divisions are not the same.

Paragraph 6.1 of Circular 3/2023. Your family qualifies on income when the household's total monthly income is strictly below the figure on your row.

Row 3 is the circular's own worked example. Larger families are handled by the checker above, up to 15 people.

Three different amounts circulate online, and only one of them is the current programme.

• Rs 20,000

  The total under circulars 06/2016 and 07/2022. Circular 3/2023 cancelled both with effect from 2024-01-01, and applications received up to 31 December 2023 were the last ones judged under 07/2022. The current total is Rs 45,000.

• Rs 5,000

  A one-off relief payment announced in December 2025 for mothers registered at a maternal clinic on or before 30 November 2025, paid through Divisional Secretariats from 16 December 2025. It was a closed one-time payment, separate from this standing voucher programme, and it is not part of the Rs 45,000.

• Rs 45,000

  The current programme, under Circular 3/2023, effective 2024-01-01. Paid as 10 monthly food vouchers of Rs 4,500, not as cash.

• Thriposha. A separate Ministry of Health supplementary-food programme with its own rules. It is not paid in vouchers.
• Aswesuma. A different benefit with its own tiers and application. See the Aswesuma calculator if that is what you are after.
• Maternity leave and the Maternity Benefits Ordinance payment. Employment law, a different statute, covered by the maternity leave calculator.
• The list of registered shops. Paragraph 9 leaves shop registration to each Divisional Secretary and no national list is published, so the leaflet in your voucher book is the only reliable source.
• Processing time. The circular sets no service standard for issuing a voucher book, so this page does not claim one.

• Ministry of Women, Child Affairs and Social Empowerment: Women and Child Affairs Circular 3/2023 (PDF)
• Ministry of Women, Child Affairs and Social Empowerment: circulars index
• Department of Census and Statistics: per capita monthly expenditure
• Ada Derana, 12 December 2025: one-off Rs 5,000 nutrition allowance (closed)

The circular PDF was read in full and every constant in this tool re-checked against it on 2026-10-13. Cabinet Memorandum MWCA/CP/02/01/23/11 is the approval the circular issues under, quoted in its paragraph 1. The page is reviewed whenever the Director of the National Secretariat for Early Childhood Development notifies a change to the per capita expenditure figure, and at least once a year.