BACKGROUNDThalassemia is more common in populations in the geographic belt from south east Asia to Africa and it is more common in an around Dibrugarh District of Assam, India. Most of the time, children present with either anaemia or failure to thrive especially seen in children belonging to tea garden area. Along with other laboratory parameters, anthropometric measurements are important especially BMI to see the status of the growth pattern. Quetlet index also known as BMI has been in use to study the growth parameters since a long time and is still being used. We wanted to study the Body Mass Index (BMI) in children with thalassemia major to determine the status of malnutrition in thalassemia, who were on regular blood transfusion therapy. METHODS50 beta thalassemia major patients, 5-15 years of age, were examined for body mass index in a tertiary care centre. They were on regular blood transfusion. This is a hospital based observational study in the