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Hindutva’s India Slips Further Down On Global Hunger Index:
Now 100th out of 119 Countries

SUNEERA TANDON

 

 

 

 

 

Hundreds of millions -- the majority of its population -- in India remains famished.

And malnourished.

Home to the world’s second-largest population, the country fared poorly -- actually worse -- on the Global Hunger Index (‘GHI‘) for 2017 released by the Washington-based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) on Thursday (October 12, 2017).

India ranked 100 out of 119 countries on the GHI, worse than last year’s position. It has now slipped a further 3 positions, down from 97 out of 118 in 2016.

A lower ranking is indicative of a higher rate of malnutrition and hunger.

India’s hunger problem remains categorised as “serious.” The rankings are based on four indicators: undernourishment, child mortality, child wasting, and child stunting.

India’s 2017 GHI score is 31.4.

A GHI score of between 20 and 34.9 points reflects serious hunger levels.

In 2017, only two other Asian countries were more hungry than India: Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The report highlights the “disturbing reality of India’s stubbornly high proportions of malnourished children.” This pulled down the overall rankings of the south Asian region, making it the worst performer on the GHI, closely followed by Africa south of the Sahara.

In fact, African countries such as Botswana (81) and Burkina Faso (92) fared much better than India, as did some middle-eastern nations like Iraq (78).

“Drought and structural deficiencies have left a large number of poor in India at risk of malnourishment in 2017,” PK Joshi, director of IFPRI South Asia, said in a statement.

How India fared against some Asian countries.

COUNTRY     RANK

China               29
Vietnam           64
Cambodia        75
Nepal              72
Indonesia        72
Myanmar        77
Sri Lanka        84
Bangladesh     88
North Korea    93
India             100
Pakistan       106
Afghanistan   107


High poverty rates and unequal distribution of wealth have left millions of households in Modi’s India without access to nutritious food.

The child wasting rates (children under five who have low weight for their height) remain high.

In 2015-16, since Modi and his BJP/RSS/Hindutva team came to power. some 21% of Indian children suffered from wasting, up from 20% a decade ago.


[Courtesy: Quartz. Edited for sikhchic.com]
October 14, 2017
 

Conversation about this article

1: Arvind Biswas (Kolkata, India), October 14, 2017, 10:14 AM.

Despite all the hoopla, we remain a country of beggars. Our only misfortune today is -- not the weather or climate, not a foreign invader -- our criminal Hindutva policies. They make a few ultra rich, while the rest (a billion!) remain hungry, nay, actually starving.

2: Arjan Singh (USA), October 15, 2017, 12:27 AM.

#1 Thank you, Arvind, for stating the reality. This comment coming from a person of Hindu background means that hope is alive. I hope you realize that had the Indian society and the Indian intelligentsia not harassed and committed human rights violations against the tiny minority Sikh community, India would not be facing this dire hunger crisis. This human rights and hunger crisis is the result of policies and violence that started in the late 1970s and culminated in nation-wide genocidal violence against the Sikh community in 1984 and the decade that followed. This was one group that the Indian State machinery could not subdue and therefore they resorted to mass state-organized genocide. Even Dr. Subramanian Swamy (the Harvard educated economist) has publicly denounced the Indian state policies of 1970s and 1980s. As they say, you reap what you sow.

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