Criticised for his comments that young girls are figure conscious and therefore do not drink milk, Narendra Modi has announced a government scheme which he touted as the mechanism to fight malnutrition.
At a gathering of sarpanches on Tuesday, Modi, on election mode, announced the scheme --Balam Sukham— to provide Rs 2 lakh each to 1, 80,000 villages to combat malnutrition.
Latest government figures suggest that about half of Gujarat’s five year olds are short of their age or stunted growth.
Modi told an interview last month that Gujarat is a vegetarian state, where the middle class are more “beauty conscious than health conscious”.
Published 18 September 2012, 19:12 IST