An estimated 75 million of India’s children aged 0-3 years are under-nourished. Despite available technology, well designed nutrition programs, necessary expertise and other resources, the overall impact on children’s nutritional status has been insufficient. In the state of Maharashtra, in the last ten years, the rate of child malnutrition has been reduced from 49.6% to 40% . However, this is an unacceptable rate which harbours an important gender dimension that 66% of malnourished children are female .

Despite large government sponsored programs as well as a host of non- governmental programs, the problem of the child undernutrition in India remains intractable. Problems include:

• Insufficient, fragmented, wrong targeted and uneven commitment by government of India.
• Limited impact of most initiatives by NGO’s and other Civil Society Organizations.
• Lack of engagement of the Corporate Sector.
• Insufficient national concern about the scale and severity of undernutrition in India, and
• Different, even conflicting, ideas among stakeholders about the problem and possible solutions.