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Vol. XXI, No. 2
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vulnerable to sexual aggression and abuse. The different cultural, social and economic situations in India have given different focus to these biological disadvantages of women. These situations also influence the way these biological disadvantages affect the health of the working women.
There have been gains in women's health status over the last four decades in the country in respects of female infant mortality, female child mortality, life expectancy at birth etc. However, surycy and studies show no substantial improvement in their health and nutritional status. Even today more girls die than boys because they are not as well nurtured as the boys, Malnourishment and neglect in the form of less food & less health case for instance is commonly the fate of girls. Girls receive less immanising vaccines against childhood diseases, less breast feeding, and nourishing food like milk or fats. In my study found that at every level girls were systematically more under-nourished. Discrimination against females from their early childhood is manifest in their conscious and sub-conscious neglect in nature, poor nutrition, denial of "prestigious" foods and absence of provision of health care. Female child is breastfed for a shorter period and mostly at the convenience of the mother, where as the male child gets fed for a longer duration and "on demands". This feeding system is also discriminatory in the nutritional needs of the two sexes.
The relative neglect of the female child is evidènt from the fact of greater prevalence of growth ritardation even in infancy, among girls, than in boys. It is such a nutritional insult commencing right from infancy and continued through all stages of development, that eventually, results in maternal health/nutritional status which harms not just the women but the succeeding generation as well.
In India, the family never sits down to a meal at the same time, The women is expected to cook and serve the roen of the family first, then comes the turn of the boys. The women and the girls are the last to eat, by which time both qualitatively and quantitatively, the food tends to run out. The food more nutritious and protective items on the day's menu tend to be cooked in a smaller quantity. A survey in India by the National Committee on the Status of Women found that women in 48.5 percent of the households ate after men. Today, neglect of a female child leading to its undernourishment, is a bigger killer than infanticide. The female infant moratality rate is 60 percent higher than formales. Child Labour
Child labour is universal in India. The percentage of rural
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