Introduction: The children of today are the future of tomorrow. Malnutrition is a global health problem among children. Globally more child deaths are attributable to under nutrition. There are many factors affecting nutritional status of children. This study was done to know the effects of various maternal factors on malnutrition among 1 to 5 year old children in urban slum population around Civil Hospital, Ahmedabad from October to November 2014.

Materials and Methods: A cross sectional study was conducted on 200 mother-child pairs in urban slums around civil hospital, Ahmedabad. Undernourished children aged 1 to 5 years were included. Grading of nutritional status was done based on weight for age as per Indian Academy of Pediatrics (IAP) Classification. A pre-tested questionnaire was used to collect data regarding various factors which may affect nutritional status of the child like anthropometry of child, maternal history including antenatal, intra-natal and postnatal history. Data was entered in Microsoft Excel 2007 and was analyzed in Epi info 7.

Results: In this study, 50.5% were males and 49.5% were females with majority 38% children in age group of 3 to 4 years. 66% children had Grade I malnutrition. Association between literacy of the mother, minimum four antenatal visits, feeding at anganwadis were the factors found to be statistically significant related with malnutrition while birth order of the child was not significant.

Conclusion: Empowering mothers with literacy and knowledge of anganwadis, exclusive breastfeeding, complementary feeding, adequate antenatal checkups can help to reduce malnutrition for which we have to join hands with one vision and one voice.