The hungama survey report - 2011: hungama, fighting hunger and malnutrition

The HUNGaMA (Hunger and Malnutrition) Survey conducted across 112 rural districts of India in 2011 provides reliable estimates of child nutrition covering nearly 20 percent of Indian children. Its objective was to understand the current situation and provide a basis for focused action. The idea of this survey was triggered by the Citizens’ Alliance against Malnutrition - a group of young leaders, most of them young parliamentarians - in the context of a wide gap in current data and knowledge on child malnutrition in India.

Of the 112 districts surveyed, 100 are those with the poorest child development indicators, and referred to as the 100 Focus Districts in this report. These districts are located across six states - Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. Having the largest sample size for a child nutrition survey since 2004, the HUNGaMA Survey captured nutrition status of 109,093 children under five years. Data collection took place between October 2010 and February 2011 in 3,360 villages across nine states. Coordinated by the Naandi Foundation, the HUNGaMA Survey presents underweight, stunting and wasting data at the district level (last done in 2004 by DLHS-2, which reported only underweight estimates). It is also the first ever effort to make the voices of over 74,000 mothers heard.