The government plans to expand the basket of subsidised food items supplied to the poor by adding edible oil, sugar and pulses to wheat and rice provided currently, as it looks to ensure complete nutrition to the deprived. The proposal is expected to be discussed at the July 24 meeting of National Development Council, a body of state chief ministers chaired by the Prime Minister. The idea was mooted by...

India has been lauded for its remarkable overall economic growth of over 8% over the last five years. But despite this high and relatively stable growth, India's underbelly is soft. The agriculture sector is performing below expectations, with growth rate of around 2.8%, it is way below the Eleventh Plan target of 4%. The Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) estimates that 22% of India's population is undernourished. Child malnutrition is...

Inadequate socio-economic infrastructure is the major cause for the backwardness of Muslims in 90 districts, which has a concentration of the community, across the country, according to a survey conducted by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR). In its interim report submitted to the Union Ministry for Minority Affairs, the ICSSR said lack of access to educational institutions, inadequate number of educational institutions, a low literacy rate among parents...

If you want to understand why the Maoists grow stronger, watch frail Shyam Charan Kisku, 5, as he keeps hunger away by nibbling at a wild berry called Kendu on a hot April afternoon. Kisku and 40-odd children in this scraggly village of mud-and-thatch homes, 180km south-east of Jharkhand’s capital Ranchi, did not get their free lunch this day under the national mid-day meal scheme, the world’s largest cooked-meal programme. Kisku’s mother,...

If recent indicators are anything to go by – the failure to keep food prices down, the proposed national food security Act, the failure to ensure even minimum wages to construction workers at projects for the upcoming Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, to recount a few – it seems the country has given up even the pretence of caring about its children or their crippling, unbudging state of malnutrition. Leaders,...