Study links child undernutrition to multidimensional poverty
The Statesman | 7 December 2025
Child undernutrition in India remains overwhelmingly concentrated in districts weighed down by multidimensional poverty, according to a new study that warns of deepening vulnerabilities unless targeted district-level interventions are urgently adopted.
Published in the November 2025 edition of BMC Public Health, the research presents a detailed picture of how deprivation across health, education and living standards continues to shape child health outcomes with alarming consistency.
Authored by Partha Das, Tamal Basu Roy, Tanu Das, Priya Das, and Subhadeep Saha of Raiganj University, along with Dr Samiran Bisai of the Public Health Nutrition Research Unit at Sidho Kanho Birsha University, the study uses NFHS-5 data and NITI Aayog’s MPI Progress Review to examine stunting, wasting and underweight among children under five. What emerges is a striking spatial clustering: the districts grappling with the highest poverty burdens are also the ones where children are most likely to suffer chronic undernutrition.
States such as Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Bihar, Odisha and West Bengal appear prominently in the analysis, forming what the researchers describe as “critical hotspots” of overlapping deprivation and nutritional vulnerability. These are regions where limited access to healthcare, poor sanitation, inadequate diets, low maternal education and fragile livelihood conditions reinforce each other, creating a cycle that undermines early childhood development.
The authors argue that while national schemes like POSHAN Abhiyaan and ICDS have expanded coverage, the layered nature of deprivation in high-burden districts requires sharper, district-specific strategies. They recommend designating severely affected districts as high priority development zones, enabling more focused public investments and stricter monitoring of child health indicators.
Expanding community-based and mobile health services for women and children is identified as a crucial step, especially for geographically remote pockets where health infrastructure remains thin. Strengthening nutrition-specific schemes, increasing district-level public health funding and ensuring tighter coordination between health, education and social welfare departments are also flagged as essential measures.
The study underscores that tackling child undernutrition cannot be limited to nutritional interventions alone. A child born into a household experiencing multidimensional poverty—characterised by overcrowded housing, unsafe drinking water, limited schooling and irregular income—faces disadvantages that begin early and compound over time. Without addressing these structural deficits, improvements in nutrition indicators will remain slow and uneven.
By linking the depth of poverty to persistent child malnutrition, the research adds weight to ongoing concerns about India’s progress toward achieving its sustainable development goals. The authors caution that unless high-burden districts receive tailored attention, India risks entrenching cycles of undernutrition and intergenerational inequity—an outcome that could have long-term consequences for the nation’s human development trajectory.