strong son preference, puts pressure on reducing the number of girls in the family.<sup>21</sup> Higher socio-economic groups have greater access to sex-selective abortion, and are therefore in a position to care more equally for the children that are born. Lower socioeconomic groups have limited access to prenatal sex selection technology, and this may lead to unequal treatment of children who are unwanted. There is, for example, considerable evidence that girls are less likely than boys to be taken for medical ⎯ treatment, and the quality of treatment sought also differs which could impact on their anthropometric status.

# **5. Assessment of the ICDS’ Program Placement**

Coverage of the ICDS program is high: a substantial proportion of India’s villages are covered by the ICDS today, and this number rose sharply during the 1990s. Of the villages sampled by the NFHS, a third had an ICDS program in place in 1992, and more than a half of the surveyed villages had it in 1998 (Table 2). A few states, notably Kerala, had virtually complete coverage already by 1992. Program coverage is especially high in the southern region, the northeastern region, and the non-poor states of the northern region. The apparent decline in coverage in Tamil Nadu during the 1990s is probably the result of re-classification of the nutritional supplementation program to the TINP (Tamil Nadu Integrated Nutrition Program), which is broadly similar in concept to the ICDS.

# (i) Program placement across states

For ease of discussion, we have grouped India’s states by region: the South, the ⎯ Northeast,<sup>22</sup> and the North. Since the Northern region is vast and highly heterogeneous comprising both the poorest and the richest states in the country ⎯ we have divided them into the “poor North” (Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan), “rich North” (Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat and Maharashtra)<sup>23</sup> and “other North” (Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, and West Bengal) (Table 2). The poor Northern states have some of the poorest outcomes in the country not only in nutrition, but also in terms of education and child survival, reflecting a history of poor governance.

The need for the program varies substantially across states (Table 2). It is especially high in the poor Northern states, where over half of the children aged below 3 were moderately or severely underweight. These are large states, with well over 40 percent of the population of the country, and therefore contribute a high proportion of the total malnourished children in the country. At the other end of the spectrum are states such as Kerala and several of the northeastern states, with the lowest levels of child malnutrition. The northeastern states tend also to have good human development indicators in terms of

> 21 Das Gupta and Bhat 1997. On son preference more broadly, see Miller 1981, Dyson and Moore 1983, and Das Gupta 1987. On gender differentials in tribal populations, see Maharatna 2000.

> 22 Sikkim is not included where data are required for 1992, since these are not available.

> 23 By the time of the 2001 Census, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Bihar had some additional states carved out of them: Uttaranchal, Chhattisgarh, and Jharkhand respectively. To facilitate intersurvey comparison, we use the old state definitions.

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