In Odisha, the weight of children under six is recorded every month by frontline workers and uploaded via the government’s Poshan Tracker app, which allows the state to monitor malnutrition trends in real time – at least on paper. The reality on the ground, however, has not moved towards a celebratory improvement: nearly 28% of children under six are stunted, and over 12% are underweight, according to the latest figures from the national Poshan Tracker database. These are not just bureaucratic data points but also hard evidence of chronic deprivation persisting despite the presence of multiple government nutrition programmes.Poshan Tracker is the Union government’s real-time digital tool for “dynamic identification of stunting, wasting, and under-weight prevalence among children and last mile tracking of nutrition service delivery.” First rolled out in 2021, the Poshan Tracker has been applauded by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as an “exemplary platform for flawlessly collecting routine administrative data on nutrition.”Yet, these figures are a cause for alarm. The problem then is not merely an absence of monitoring, but the inability to act meaningfully on what is already known.What the numbers meanStunting is not merely a biological condition. It is the result of poverty, neglected early childhood care, inadequate feeding, recurrent infection and environmental deprivation. A stunted child is set on a trajectory of compromised cognitive development, attenuated school learning, repeated illness and reduced lifetime earning potential. It is both an outcome and a predictor of intergenerational disadvantage.Underweight status, especially the 12-13% figure reported in Odisha, is equally worrying. It suggests a substantial portion of the child population is experiencing malnutrition severe enough to impair immunity, school attendance and academic performance.Wasting is historically considered the most urgent nutritional crisis. Odisha’s near-halving of wasting from 5.9 to 2.9% over three years highlights some success in crisis response. But the chronic, pervasive character of stunting and underweight conditions reflects structural challenges that cannot be solved with episodic interventions alone.Much ado about data, little about deploymentThe Poshan Tracker is intended as a revolution in governance: monthly height-and-weight data collected at Aanganwadi centres, digitised into dashboards, analysed for hotspots, and used to trigger targeted interventions. This system has reportedly enabled 99% monitoring coverage for children aged 0-6 and the alleged near-universal Aadhaar authentication of beneficiaries.A 2024 research showed that Poshan Tracker often underestimated undernutrition in children in comparison to the numbers estimated by the National Family Health Survey 2019-2021. The research attributed this underestimation to the fact that the tracking is tasked to overburdened community health workers.Besides, tracking alone is not a guarantee of corrective action. A case in point here is the lack of revision of Supplementary Nutrition Programme (SNP) cost per head despite the rising cost of food – eggs in particular. Anganwadi workers have repeatedly called out this and admitted that they have been forced to compromise on some or the other ground to meet SNP requirements. It was finally increased in March, albeit marginally. The invisible workforceWhat is routinely absent from official narratives is the question of labour. Nutrition delivery in Odisha, much like other parts of the country, rests heavily on Anganwadi workers and helpers who collect this child growth data monthly, prepare meals, manage take‑home rations, counsel mothers and convene community awareness events.As a key component of Mission Poshan 2.0, these Anganwadi worker are also expected to conduct regular Community Based Events (CBEs) “for disseminating essential messages and to counsel pregnant and lactating women, and their husbands/mothers-in-law on appropriate nutrition and health behaviour.” These women are often underpaid, overstretched, and excluded from formal labour rights. Remuneration is traditionally honorarium-based, even as workloads intensify and data responsibilities escalate. In December, Anganwadi workers, who used to get Rs 10,000 per month, and Anganwadi helpers, who used to get Rs 7,000 per month staged a massive protest in Bhubaneswar demanding a salary of Rs 26,000 and Rs 13,000 respectively. They also demanded better phones and a commensurate mobile recharge amount to be able to do their app and internet-based work. Anganwadi workers and cook‑helpers are yet to be formally recognised and adequately remunerated as skilled labour. Data collection, food preparation, growth monitoring and community engagement are not volunteer roles, they are essential public services that deserve secure contracts, pensions and other protections. Without that, the frontline infrastructure of the nutrition system rests on this invisible, under-compensated labour force. In doing so, underpaid, feminised care work is treated as a civic duty, obscuring the reality that these workers sustain a national welfare system while remaining excluded from its benefits.The real problemOdisha’s NFHS‑5 data reveals that over 64% of women of reproductive age and nearly 62% of pregnant women are anaemic, with figures rising to 71.7% in tribal regions (Odisha Vikash). Maternal anaemia sets off a cascade of risks: low birth weight, restricted foetal growth and compromised early child development. Tackling child malnutrition without first securing maternal nutrition is like building a roof before the foundation.On the other hand, there have been some commendable promises on the nutrition and health of children in recent months. In March, the School and Mass Education minister, Nityananda Gond, announced the inclusion of midday meals (MDM) for students in Class 9 and 10 in addition to those up to Class 8. He also declared that the meals would soon have eggs thrice instead of just twice a week.He further noted that the additional MDM costs for this – over Rs 500 crores annually – would be borne entirely by the state government. In June, the state government announced another revision to the material costs to facilitate the inclusion of items like nutritional laddoos and an additional egg, intended to boost protein intake and dietary diversity, under the PM Poshan Scheme.Around the same time, the Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister, Krushna Chandra Patra, announced the opening of Jan Poshan Kendras in every Gram Panchayat to offer key staples such as rice, atta, sugar, salt, and pulses at subsidised rates on par with the Public Distribution System. These are basic nutritional building blocks that could directly address nutrition and food security issues in the state, if implemented correctly. And yet, the delivery falters. That failure is not due to a lack of funds, as the state has a revenue surplus, but a lack of political will to follow through on people’s right to food. Worse, even as it touts these progressive schemes, the state continues to quietly undercut access. One such example is the mandatory e-KYC requirement for PDS beneficiaries – a procedural bottleneck that has led to thousands being struck off ration rolls. For many, especially elderly people, widows, or those in remote areas, Aadhaar-linked authentication remains an exclusionary barrier rather than an enabler.The issue at hand, therefore, is not the number of schemes on paper. It is the refusal to guarantee the essentials that make nutrition possible in the first place. Programmatic enthusiasm cannot substitute political commitment. Structural challengesOdisha must convert the data generated by Poshan Tracker into action. Districts or blocks flagged with high undernutrition must trigger integrated missions: water and sanitation upgrades, Anganwadi augmentations, maternal counselling, food security support, and enhanced school‑feeding linkages for pregnant adolescents.Convergence between Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), public health, WASH, education, and food systems must also be strengthened since midday meals alone cannot compensate when households lack access to nutrition, clean water, toilets, and maternal rest.Odisha’s statistics are both a source of pride and alarm. It monitors 99.9% of its children and conducts millions of awareness events annually. Yet, nearly one-third of its youngest children begin life fighting with chronic undernutrition. If Odisha continues to treat nutrition as a budget line or scheme list, it will continue to produce reports without resolution. But if it chooses to treat nutrition as an entitlement for all, a moral promise, and a structural agenda, it can turn tracking into transformation. The children of the state and their futures deserve nothing less.