Stunting, wasting and underweight are the indicators used to monitor nutritional status in children, but they do not identify the children with concurrent anthropometric failures. CIAF can identify undernutrition by combining several indicators of nutritional status- weight-for-age, height-for-age and weight-for-height to determine the nutritional status of children under five years of age.The present study aims to investigate the geographical region and state wise distribution of CIAF and determinates of CIAF in India. The study used secondary data set from National Family Health Survey (2019-2021),India. The study comprises of 180646 children aged 0-59 months. Among children (0-59 months), 48.7 percent of children experienced anthropometric failure (overall prevalence of undernutrition based on CIAF), 16.6 percent of children experience wasting only, 34.2 percent children experienced underweight, and 30.1 percent of children experienced stunting. The prevalence of child undernutrition was more elevated in poor economic households. The study also revealed that prevalence of CIAF is confined in the Western region (57.0%), followed by Eastern (55.3%), Central (51.1%), Southern (45.5%), North eastern (45.2%) and Northern (39.4%) region. CIAF reflects an accurate reflection of undernutrition in children. CIAF can identify more undernourished children than the conventional index.
