Education News

Uttar Pradesh Pathetic record The State of the World’s Children Report 2005, a UNICEF document released in various parts of the country earlier this month, paints a grim picture of childhood in India especially in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state (166 million) which hosts one-sixth of the country’s children. According to UNICEF, one billion children worldwide (i.e every second child globally) is living in poverty and deprivation. The major indicators of deprivation which strongly impact children’s lives says the report, are lack of adequate shelter, unsafe drinking water and sanitation, health and food insecurity, and lack of access to a school. Other indicators of deprivation are infant mortality, malnutrition, child labour and child abuse — the result of a variety of economic, social and cultural factors. India’s pathetic record in upholding child rights attracts stinging — and deserved — criticism. Of every 100 children born in India only 35 births are registered, only 93 will make it to their first birthday, five will die of malnutrition, 42 will remain underweight and only 25 will get through primary school. Girl children suffer more. The sex ratio (between ages 0 and six) has dipped from 927 in 1991 to 916 at present, 43 percent of adolescent girls are anaemic while their annual school drop out rate is an alarming 31 percent. Barring some states like Chattisgarh, Bihar, Assam and Madhya Pradesh which fare even worse on some indicators, Uttar Pradesh fares badly on every chosen indicator. Thus, while maternal mortality rate in India is 540 per 1000, in UP it is 707. Likewise the infant mortality rate is 83 per 1,000 and under-five mortality 123 as compared to the all India figures of 67 and 96. Shockingly a child dies every 50 seconds in the state and 33 percent of new borns are underweight against the national average of 26 percent. Only six percent of households, (cf. 36 percent nationwide) use iodised salt while only 26 percent of households in India’s largest and most populous state have toilets against a national average of 37 percent. Not surprisingly average life expectancy at birth is 57.2 years against the national average of 61. The only bright spot is the access to improved sources (pipes and hand pumps) of drinking water. While the national average is 83 percent, in Uttar Pradesh 89 percent have access to drinking water. Unsurprisingly the number of children living below the poverty line is 24,196, much higher than in Kerala (1,281), Gujarat (5,269), West Bengal (8,431), Uttaranchal (1,137) and Maharashtra (9,211). According to State of the World’s Children 2005 the prime cause for the sad condition of UP’s children is that women are short changed. The standards of a primary health centre for every 25,000-30,000 population with 24 hour facilities for delivery and childcare and a hospital per 1.5 lakh population are heavily unmet in a state where 707 women per 1,000 die in child birth every year and only 28.6 percent of child births receive trained assistance. “One area of immediate concern…