How fixing female malnutrition can boost India's economy by $15-46 billion

Malnutrition is one of the leading causes of about half of India's childhood deaths, and if they are affected at an early age, there can be long-term consequences

Afsana Bano is 25, or so her Aadhaar national identity card said. With glee, she confessed that she was born in 2001. That made her 18, her 5’7 frail figure and delicate bones cradling a three-day-old baby that weighed 2.6 kg instead of the ideal 3.3 kg at this stage.

Bano’s levity and ignorance is representative of a cycle that keeps millions of Indian mothers and children, particularly in the most populous, poorest states, undernourished and incapable of learning and earning enough, thus holding back Indian economic progress, according to several research studies.

Bano was 18