Multidimensional Deprivation among Children in India and Bangladesh

Multidimensional poverty among children continues to be a serious issue. The paper examines multidimensional deprivation of children in different age groups based on Demographic and Health Survey data from India and Bangladesh. The extent of child poverty has been measured based on multidimensional poverty approach and multidimensional overlapping deprivation approach (MODA). Further, logistic regression has been used to determine the chances of multidimensional deprivation among children in the two age group, i.e. 0 to 5 years and 6 to 17 years, for both India and Bangladesh. It is found that multidimensional poverty among children is higher in Bangladesh than in India in both age groups. Further, the intensity of poverty remains lower among children in the 6 to 17 years age group compared to the 0 to 5 years category in both India and Bangladesh. Logistic regression results indicate that educated and empowered mothers reduce the chances of multidimensional deprivation of children. The results suggest that there is a need to develop child age-centric, region and dimension-specific social policy to reduce multidimensional poverty among children and to protect the child’s rights.