Over 33 lakh children in India malnourished, 17.7 lakh of them severely malnourished: Govt data

Maharashtra, Bihar, and Gujarat have the highest number of malnourished children

NEW DELHI: Over 33 lakh children in India are malnourished and more than half of them fall in the severely malnourished category with Maharashtra, Bihar and Gujarat topping the list, the WCD ministry has said in response to an RTI query.

Prompting concern that the Covid pandemic could exacerbate the health and nutrition crisis among the poorest of the poor, the Women and Child Development ministry estimates that there are 17,76,902 (17.76 lakh/1.7 million) severely acute malnourished children (SAM) and 15,46,420 (15.46 lakh/1.5 million) moderately acute malnourished (MAM) children as of October 14, 2021.

The total 33,23,322 (33.23 lakh/3.3 million) is a compilation of data from 34 states and union territories, the ministry said in response to an RTI query by PTI. The numbers were registered on the Poshan tracker app developed last year as a governance tool for real-time monitoring of nutritional outcomes.

While the numbers are alarming in themselves, a comparison with figures from last November make them even more so. A 91 per cent rise in the number of SAM children has been seen between November 2020 and October 14, 2021 — up from 9,27,606 (9.27 lakh) to 17.76 lakh now.