World Vision India Releases its India Child Well-Being Report 2021

Chennai: World Vision India released the third edition of the India Child Well-Being Report 2021. This report provides a nuanced understanding of child well-being through a comprehensive index for 725 districts across 28 States and 9 Union Territories. The Index maps Child Well-Being under 38 indicators and four domains – Health, Hygiene, Protection, and School Education.

Dr Rakesh Ranjan, Mission Director-Aspirational Districts, Niti Ayog released the India Child Well-Being 2021 report and reiterated a mutual dedication in the direction of realising the rights of children in India. Releasing the report he said, “As government and development partners like NGOs are committed to the welfare of children, we have the moral responsibility to make continuous efforts in communities to ensure access to key government schemes by focusing on last-mile service delivery. Together we need to create a huge awareness within communities to address issues like child health and nutrition.”

Knowledge partners for the India Child Well-Being Report 2021 include Poverty Learning Foundation (PLF), University of Bath, United Kingdom, Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), Hyderabad and Sri Jai Narain Misra Post Graduate (JNM PG) College, Lucknow.

Speaking at the report release, Madhav Bellamkonda, National Director and CEO, World Vision India said, “The report highlights that the country has made good progress in the past few decades in several parameters related to child well-being. Despite the progress, there are gaps and inequities. The report shows that gains and deprivations are unevenly distributed across States and districts. World Vision India believes that the true measure of any nation’s standing is how well it provides the environment for child well-being.  We need to act now and reignite opportunities to ensure every child in the country not only survives but also thrives. If we fail to do so, the worst impact of the COVID-19 pandemic will be felt for decades to come which could reverse the progress made to date for children.”

The present report highlights the country-level status of the districts and states across India in the composite Child Well-Being indices. The indicators were selected after considering specific indicators linked to Child Well-Being and their policy relevance. The district-level data for the selected indicators have been extracted from the following sources: the National Achievement Survey 2017, National Crime Records Bureau 2019, National Family Health Survey-5 2019-20, National Sample Survey Organisation (76th round schedule 1.2), and Unified District Information System for Education 2019-20.

Kerala, Uttarakhand and Punjab are the best performing states in the composite Child Well-Being index. Under the health domain, Mizoram leads while Bihar records the least. In terms of hygiene, Sikkim stands as the best performer, whereas Odisha ranks as the lowest performer. In the area of child protection, Arunachal Pradesh leads, while Kerala exhibits poor performance. Kerala stands tall in terms of school education, while Meghalaya is at the tail end.

Child Well-Being Scores for the States and Union Territories for the Four Different Dimensions

The analysis of district-wise data sheds light on the performance of the aspirational districts across the four domains of the India Child Well-Being 2021 report. The study on the impact of the pandemic on the well-being of children provides a deeper analysis of how COVID-19 affected children.

This report is a call for States to look at their respective scores on the dimensions of Child Well-Being, and to work on the priority areas of intervention with a specific plan of action. The report hopes to trigger policy level changes, seek better budgetary allocations and initiate discussions with all stakeholders, which can help in enhancing the quality of life of all children in the country.

This is the third edition of the India Child Well-Being Report, analysing the Status of Children in the country, both in terms of well-being and access to services.