In hospital wards, children are packed two or three to a bed: young girls with vacant eyes and stick-thin limbs lying listlessly. Four-year-old Ranjana Prasad, at 17½ pounds, is about half the weight she should be. Her mother, Parvati, had six children, but two of the girls died within weeks of birth, and now her youngest is likely to be permanently stunted.
Nearly half of Indian children younger than 5 will grow up stunted, with 43 percent underweight, proportions similar to those in Ethiopia and Niger, and in absolute terms comprising nearly a third of the global population of stunted children. Half of India’s mothers are anemic, while many newborn babies are given diluted animal’s milk rather than breast milk for their first three days of life — causing health problems that not only impose a direct cost on the health-care system but also are a drag on the economy.
“A child that is stunted is less able to fulfill its potential,” said Sarah Crowe, South Asia spokeswoman for UNICEF. “Its ability to learn at school, and later to earn a living and contribute to the nation’s wealth, is forever held back.”
The fact that birthrates are so much higher in poorer parts of India also suggests that migration from impoverished rural communities to the overburdened cities is likely to accelerate in the coming decade, economists say.
Gorakhpur, already struggling to cope with the influx, is doing little to prepare for the future. “To me, it seems the government runs on a day-by-day basis, without any short-term, medium-term or long-term planning,” said Jitendra Pratap Singh, city magistrate.
In Delhi, the Finance Ministry’s chief economic adviser, Kaushik Basu, admitted that there are risks. “If the newly minted youngsters are not adequately educated and employed, they can become a source of disturbance, as happened in many Arab countries,” he said. “We need to be concerned about this, though, frankly, if youngsters by causing a disturbance can strengthen democracy, I am not so sure that that is a bad thing.”
His greatest worry, though, is that the demographic dividend is followed “almost like an echo” by a bulge in the old-age population. “This is all the more reason for us to sit up and make use of the dividend while it lasts,” he said. “If the state can provide better infrastructure and expand education, the next 25 years will be a great opportunity. My bet is India will seize it.”
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