The story so far: The Global Hunger Index for 2024 states that a ‘serious’ level of hunger is prevalent in India. It ranks India 105th among 127 countries, giving it a score of 27.3. A score below 9.9 indicates low levels of hunger, 10-19.9 moderate, 35-49.9 alarming and above 50 extremely alarming.
The score is based on four broad parameters, that is, child stunting (share of children under five with lower height proportional to their age, reflecting chronic undernutrition), undernourishment (share of population with insufficient caloric intake), child wasting (share of children under five with lower weight proportional to their height) and child mortality (share of children who die before their fifth birthday). The report traced 13.7% of the population to be undernourished, 35.5% of children as stunted, 18.7% of children wasted and 2.9% of children dying before their fifth birthday. As per the survey, India has the highest child wasting rate globally.