Q5(c) · UPSC Civil Services Mains 2020 · Sociology GS 2 · 10 marks · 1 min read

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Give an account of the consequences and remedies of chronic malnutrition in India.

Topic: Perspectives on the study of Indian society. Syllabus: Perspectives on the study of Indian society: Indology (G.S. Ghurye); Structural functionalism (M.N. Srinivas); Marxist sociology (A.R. Desai). Same official PYQ from year-wise 2020 and Perspectives on the study of Indian society.

Revision summary

Chronic malnutrition shows as stunting, wasting and anaemia. It reproduces class, caste and gender inequality in the body. Women and Adivasi–Dalit children carry a heavier share. Remedies are PDS, ICDS, meals, WASH and women’s household claims. Technical food alone cannot fix ranked plates.

Model answer

Introduction

Chronic malnutrition is long-run deficit of food, care, and sanitation that shows in stunting, wasting, and anaemia. In India it is a class, caste, and gender wound, not a missing kitchen tip.

Body

Consequences

  • Child stunting cuts later learning and wages, reproducing A. R. Desai’s unequal class structure in the body.
  • Women’s anaemia and low birth weight continue Seed-and-Earth households that feed the male line first.
  • Adivasi and Dalit belts show higher burden where land and PDS leak.
  • National productivity and disease load rise; the middle class pays in hospitals what the poor already paid in height.

Remedies

  • Food security: PDS, ICDS, mid-day meals, and maternity cash as social security, not charity.
  • Women’s entitlement inside the household, plus wages and childcare, or the plate will still be ranked.
  • Water, toilets, and green-cover local ecology, because infection eats nutrients.
  • Land and MGNREGA raise the kisan–mazdoor floor that calories need.

Limit

  • Fortified packets without patriarchy change become a technical fix for a social disease.

Flow diagram

flowchart TD
  M[Chronic malnutrition] --> S[Stunting anaemia]
  S --> I[Inequality reproduced]
  F[Food rights gender care WASH] --> R[Remedies]

Conclusion

Consequences of chronic malnutrition are a smaller, sicker, and more unequal generation. Remedies are food rights, women’s claims, sanitation, and agrarian security together.

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