Almost half of India’s children are malnourished; 1000 die every day from diarrhoea; hundreds of millions have no access to proper sanitation. These figures provide a grim counterpoint to the glitzy high-rises and designer shopping malls that have sprung up throughout the country’s major cities.
population
India’s children and the Class Struggle
Fifty years into Independence, India’s children have little to celebrate: 6.3 crore (63 million) of them are still out of school. This despite the constitutional directive urging all states to provide “free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of 14 years”. The Constitution envisaged fulfilling this promise by 1960. Yet, if present trends continue, India is still 50 years away from reaching the goal.
The class ceiling
India’s 17 years of economic change have widened the gap between rich and poor. More than a quarter of the population lives below the official poverty line, subsisting on roughly $US1 ($1.04) a day; one in four city dwellers lives on less than 50 cents a day; and nearly half of all children are malnourished. ->> SMH | Read the Full Story