Purpose. To determine the nutritional status (underweight and overweight) among Meitei children and adolescents. Methods. Cross-sectional data on 854 subjects (384 boys and 470 girls) were collected during the months of May 2009 to August 2009 following house-to-house survey. An anthropometric rod and a weighing scale were used to measure height and weight. The presence of underweight and overweight has been evaluated using the international cutoff points for children and adolescents. MS-Excel software was used for all statistical analyses. Results. A high prevalence of underweight (30.21%) and overweight (3.12%) in the present study was found among children and adolescent boys, respectively. Among girls, the prevalence of both underweight (33.86%) and overweight (5.18%) was reported higher among children than adolescents, and the differences in the distribution were significant at 0.05 levels. The overall prevalence of underweight (28.29%) was found more or less the same among boys and girls, but overweight (5.10%) was reported higher among girls than boys (2.34%). Conclusion. The possible reasons for both forms of malnutrition among Meitei children and adolescents could be traced through poverty, low dietary intake, socioeconomic condition, nutrition transition, and changing lifestyles. The other possible reasons could be due to peer pressure, eating habits, or emotional factor. 1. Introduction Adolescence is a period of transition between childhood and adulthood that demands extra nutrients and energy-rich food for rapid growth and maturation [1]. Inadequate diet and unfavourable environmental condition in developing nations like India may adversely affect the growth and nutrition of adolescents. Malnutrition, both undernutrition and overnutrition, refers to an impairment of health, resulting from a deficiency or from an excess or imbalance of nutrients. It is of public health significance among adolescents across the world [2]. The coexistence of overweight/obesity and underweight is rather common in developing countries and is found to be increased proportionally over time [3, 4]. Several studies have investigated the nutritional status of children and adolescents from different parts of India [5–7]. In India alone, there are approximately 60 million children who are underweight [8], this prevalence is higher in rural areas compared to urban areas [9]. India has one of the highest underweight burdens in the world, even twice that of sub-Sahara region. However, India is now also beginning to experience the emerging problem of overweight [10, 11]. A
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