Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting lockdown has led to children being further lack of nutrition support, adding to the burden of families, not able to meet ends due to dwindling livelihoods. To tide this crisis, there is an urgent need to strengthen food security and nutritional support, along with awareness on hygiene and social distancing. In the absence of timely intervention, a possible increase in the number of severely acutely malnourished children is staring us in the journey of development, who shall be disease vulnerable, attributing to lack of immunity. This could have long-lasting health and socio-economic impact for India.

Even though India had considerable economic progress over the years, hunger and poverty have prevailed in the country. Out of the total population of 1.3 billion people, 190.7 million people are undernourished. And 25 per cent of the children experience pangs of hunger. The upgrade in the socio-economic strata must start by uplifting the weaker sections so that hunger deaths can be prevented.

Described best by Founder of Bhavyata Foundation, Mr Kulin Maniar, the way to offset the crisis of hunger and poverty issue in any part of the world comes with community participation.

Post lockdown, an atmosphere of fear, insecurity and uncertainty gripped the entire world. Hunger pandemic became synonymous with coronavirus spread. Many Samaritans came forward to help feed daily meals to these needy people.

Bhavyata Foundation’s Initiative

We, at Bhavyata Foundation with our core team, felt it was a time to take a call to reach out. As a famous proverb goes, “give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime”. We better opted to donate monthly groceries and essentials to these affected people, than to provide cooked meals. And again, we found our community support in unique ways. Here’s how a family of two children motivated by our hunger-free nation initiative helped us in raising funds.

Mr Samrat Dasgupta, a Corporate Professional hailing from Mumbai, decided to host a charity Rock n Pop concert involving his two children, Mallika and Kanishk to play some cover versions of their favourite music through his YouTube channel and received a tremendous response from the across sections of the society.

Our on-field volunteers were the lifeline of the distribution of essentials across the country. This included many red and containment zones, went way ahead to make this initiative reach out to the last mile. A couple (above 60 years of age) with a blind husband and, wife Indira Hari Rawat struggling to pay for rent and food, who used to segregate plastics in Kabaadkhaanaa, hailing from Dharavi said to one of our volunteers, Neelam “I was feeling so helpless. I fear that hunger may kill many like us before Covid-19,” while receiving delivery of grocery kits. Their distress was full of agony and hunger.”

Pandemic And Asia’s Largest Slum

Social distancing is not a choice in Dharavi, Asia’s biggest slum, spread over 2.1 sq km. It houses 7 lakh people in small shanties stacked next to each other. As per guidelines of NITI Aayog, our volunteers also have even spent hours educating the communities in urban Mumbai. Mostly to adhere to norms of social distancing, the importance of sanitizations and ways to overcome psychological barriers and stigma. This initiative significantly impacted the lives of daily wage workers, those with informal jobs, maids, street vendors and all rural & urban poor.

Torchbearers of Six Sigma, dispatching tiffins to the majority of Mumbai, the famous ‘’Dabbawalas’’, have themselves become subdued with the plight of hunger and agony. The irony of the circumstances has transformed meal givers to meal seekers. Many distraught families are languishing in need of help due to the massive economic downturn. Bhavyata Foundation is committed to supporting vulnerable population with nutrition, protection by hygiene and sanitation.

Mrs Bhagyashree Chandramohan Telkar, who helps her husband to run a small tailoring shop, said they were unable to pay their only co-worker and had to stop the business in the lockdown. Their family residing in Indira Nagar, Ghatkopar West. They had to sleep empty stomach for four days as stated by one of our volunteer Sureka Dilip Gunjan.

“Alka Gharshi, belonging to Banganga, Mumbai, who didn’t lit up her stove till afternoon. The day provided in addition to that grocery kit hastily started preparing food for her 3 children. Her husband had undergone heart bypass surgery before lockdown, which ate up the majority of their savings. And this lockdown didn’t allow him to re-join the factory, thus creating huge financial distress for the family.”

The Consistent Efforts

Bhavyata Foundation has undertaken efforts to reach out to needy families and daily wage workers during the Covid-19 pandemic. It has till now created an everlasting impact in the Maximum city of Mumbai and across six other zones (Thane, Palghar, Meerut, Delhi, Gadhchiroli and Aurangabad) in the country by impacting lives of 10,030 families (around 50,150 needy people till date), in two months through the distribution of grocery kits, each containing the monthly essentials.

“Kalurama Kare survive as an optional labourer (as he had crossed 60 years of age) in Karepada. He was overwhelmed to see the consignment of grocery kit by Bhavyata foundation under the arms of Mr Tulsiram Das. It was beyond his imagination as tears rolled down his eyes because their community has been starving for a week. It was found that the whole community was undernourished. And has recently been unwell due to unavailability of clean water and their isolation from the mainstream village area.”

We remain indebted to our numerous volunteers, who are continuously reaching out to the needy ones, having imbibed Bhavyata Foundation’s mission as their driving force. Bhavyata Foundation remains thankful to all the supporters and well-wishers.

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THE HORROR OF MALNUTRITION

Amongst the gravest of problems India and other developing countries are suffering from right now, malnutrition stands strong. It is the condition when the diet lacks one or more nutrients or contains too much of them than necessary. Infants and young children need high nutrition for their growth and development. That is why they are the most vulnerable to malnutrition. In addition every one out of three children in India is prey to malnutrition. In addition, the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that malnutrition is responsible for 54% of child mortality worldwide[1], while for children under the age of five years, childhood underweight accounts for 35.0% of all deaths worldwide[2]. Developed countries, 52.0 per cent and 34.0–62.0 per cent of school-aged children are stunted and underweight, respectively.

Malnutrition can be caused to a certain degree by several factors such as insufficient food consumption, intake of poisonous food, illnesses, lack of sanitation, social deprivation and genetic contribution. Reports documented that children who live in households that lack access to sufficient clean, healthy food are more likely to be predisposed to poor nutrition and health-related problems than children from families that have secured source of food.[3]

Malnutrition And Undernutrition

The problem of malnutrition is now coupled with undernutrition, hence giving birth to the double burden of malnutrition. The double burden of malnutrition can manifest at the individual level when the development of two or more forms of malnutrition is observed simultaneously. For example, a particular child often manifests as stunting or micronutrient deficiencies co-occurring with overweight or obesity. Above all, on the household level, the double burden of malnutrition may arise from contrasting forms of malnutrition in multiple family members. For example, when a mother is overweight, and a child is underweight. While at the population level, both undernutrition and overweight are prevalent in the same community, nation, or region. Studies conducted in LMICs, such as Brazil, China and Russia reported a high prevalence of underweight or stunting and overweight in the same population, or on household levels with both obese and stunted or underweight individuals.[4]

RURAL MALNUTRITION

Marked by significant malnutrition and ceaseless hunger, consistent poverty and lack of economic opportunities, rural areas continue to be in crisis in many parts of the world. A substantial portion of the world’s poor people dwells in rural areas. Rural populations account for almost half of the world’s total population. Above all, the transformation of pastoral economic and social situations needs a holistic financial approach which sincerely connects rural and urban economies. Bhavyata Foundation has taken healthy initiatives that are helping in the process of strengthening the connections between rural and urban economics. In addition, this approach can mark a significant growth in the overall situation of India. Among the six initiatives of the organization, there is Hunger Free Nation which sheds light upon the access of malnourished children of Mumbai to nutritious food.

Bhavyata Foundation’s Efforts

Bhavyata Foundation focuses on bringing reforms to the socio-cultural-economic field of India and restoring values. Sustainable development, empowerment of the underprivileged, and paving the way of economic and social prosperity are the nodal points of the projects of the organisation. In addition, Hunger Free Nation undertakes the responsibility of eradicating the horror of hunger and poverty in the slums of Mumbai. Above all, the focus of the Foundation was always education-centric empowerment. And development and eradication of the horror of hunger in the nation. In the year 2019–2020, Bhavyata Foundation adopted a slum school in Majiwada, Thane. Keeping in needs of challenges posed by malnutrition and access to hygiene and sanitation. It also provided catering to daily nutritional needs of 110 students in two schools of Navjeevan Prathamik

Vidyamandir made available daily hot, nutritious lunch meals to all students. More than eight workshops and seminars in the field of wellness, health and hygiene, sports and exercise, pedagogy, nutrition and cooking, prenatal and ante-natal care were organised.

Infants and young children are the backbones of our Nation. Above all, a healthy child marks the healthy development of our country. In addition, the removal of poverty, malnutrition and hunger is our foremost priority and united we can stand strong enough to withstand the ravages of the problems.

References

[1] D. Christopher, B. John, W. Watkins, and A. Walker, Nutrition in paediatrics: basic science, clinical application, Decker, B. C., Hamilton, Canada, 2008.

[2] M. de Onis, M. Blössner, and E. Borghi, “Prevalence and trends of stunting among pre-school children, 1990–2020,” Public Health Nutrition, vol. 15, no. 1, pp. 142–148, 2012.

[3] M. Bhargava, P. Aggarwal, SD. Kandpal, and J. Semwal, “Magnitude of undernutrition in urban and rural school-going children of district Dehradun using WHO reference standards Ntl,” J of Community Med, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 452–457, 2015.

[4] Modjadji, P., Madiba, S. The double burden of malnutrition in rural health and demographic surveillance system site in South Africa: a study of primary school children and their mothers. BMC Public Health 19, 1087 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7412-y

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