New Delhi: After a dismissal by the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development on Tuesdays refuted the Harvard research, which claimed that 67 lakh youngsters in India are “zero-food” youngsters.

The ministry mentioned the article is a “deliberate and malicious attempt” to sensationalise “fake news”.

The Harvard research, printed within the JAMA Network Open, doesn’t acknowledge the significance of breast milk for infants. “Out of the so-called 19.3% Zero Food Children referred to by the study, 17.8% had received breast milk and only 1.5% children have been claimed as non-breast fed,” the assertion mentioned.

The ministry additionally mentioned the research doesn’t have a scientific definition of “zero-food children”. “The methodology followed is opaque and has attempted to interpret single-day recalls by those who were supposedly contacted. No state government or any private organisation in India has ever reported about starving children,” the ministry mentioned in an announcement.

“The JAMA article does not acknowledge the importance of breast milk for infants who are more than six months old and has instead looked at only the feeding of such infants with animal milk/formula, solids or semi-solids etc.,” it added.

The ministry additionally mentioned that the research has not referred to publicly obtainable information of greater than eight crore youngsters measured on the Poshan Tracker by the 13.9 lakh Anganwadi Centres throughout the nation.