It is estimated that India lost 1.8 million children under five in 2008. That is more than 200 child deaths every hour, each day, or more than three deaths every minute. Out of about 25 million babies born every year in India, one million die. Most who survive do not get to grow up and develop well. About 48 per cent are stunted (sub-normal height) and 43 per cent are...

The budget has allocated of total Rs160,887 crore, or 36.4% Plan allocation, to the social sector. The Bharat Nirman group of welfare schemes has together been allocated Rs58,000 crore. The income of workers and helpers at anganwadis, or government-run day-care centres, has been doubled. The move is expected to benefit nearly 2.2 million people. However, it has not been replicated for voluntary accredited social health activists of the National Rural...

JANAKI KNOWS well that it is hard for her to rear more than four children. Yet she is not willing to go to the sterilisation camp. Her husband would be of no help in taking such a decision. “He drinks heavily, beats me up every day,” she says. Janaki is not able to express her fears in clear terms, but it is difficult to imagine her summoning up the courage...

With three small children to raise in a dirt-poor village in eastern India’s Bihar state, farm labourer Renu Devi is an unsung rural supermom who shuttles between home and field every day. But the demure 30-year-old mother does not forget to bring her children to the biannual Vitamin A rounds in Bagwanpur Rati, one of the villages in Vaishali district of Bihar. This is because Vitamin A deficiency is a major...

Anganwadi workers, women’s self-help groupsand accredited social health activists from across the state gathered at the Azad Maidan on Wednesday to protest against the government’s decision of distributing instant packaged food in anganwadis as supplementary nutrition. “Anganwadis are supposed to provide fresh, nutritious food to pregnant women and children till six years of age. The government has instead started providing ready-to-eat food packets to them,” said Sonya Gill, president, all India...