Hyderabad: Cramming ideologies and turning a blind eye to their implementation is a common happening in our nation. While countries like the USA and Britain have started School Meal Programs in the 1940s to improve children’s health and well-being, India has launched the Midday Meal Scheme in 1995 with the intent of providing healthy food for children from low-income families.
This eminent scheme is aimed at cutting through poverty and providing a balanced diet to school-going children. But it is worrisome to see the number of students utilizing this scheme has dropped down to 80 lakhs within the past 3 years.
During 2015-16, 10 crore students were enrolled under this scheme while the number dropped to 9.17 crores by 2018-19 according to the government census. On the other hand, complaints about falling standards in food quality and implementation of the scheme are on the rise.
Some startling facts were revealed in the national survey held last year under the report “Involvement of Teachers in Non-teaching Activities and Its Effect of Education”. According to the report, teachers are busy shuttling between pulse polio immunization campaigns, election duties and midday meal registers and unable to devote even one-fifth of their time towards teaching.
Teachers are stressed out due to meagre allocation of funds and lack of storage facilities for purchased food products. As a result, crores of students are suffering from dearth of proper food and education. The State and Central governments must quickly put an end to these miseries.
National Programme of Nutritional Support to Primary Education (NP-NSPE) was launched on 15th August 1995 to increase primary school attendance. It was changed to National Programme of Mid-Day Meals in 2001 with the aim of providing every child a minimum content of 300 calories and 8-12 grams of protein each day of school for 200 days.
Primary school children must be given 450 calories, 12 grams protein each day and secondary school children must be given 700 calories, 20 grams protein each day. Although the scheme came into force, the majority of students are not receiving its benefits.
The government of Uttar Pradesh has slapped a journalist with conspiracy case for filming the instance of feeding children in a school in Mirzapur with rice-salt and roti-salt. The students have confirmed that such subpar meals are commonplace.
The government has then ordered for an investigation into midday meals implementation in 20 villages. 27 kids have died of food poisoning in a village in Bihar in 2013. 94 kids have died in a fire accident in Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu in 2004. But our governments haven’t learnt any lessons from these incidents. According to the reports, 15 states have filed 35 complaints in the past 3 years about the implementation of this scheme. 900 kids have fallen ill by consuming substandard food served in schools.
National Family Health Survey has revealed that two-thirds of children in our country are malnourished. 35.7% are underweight, 38.4% are stunted and 21% are feeble and undernourished. A balanced diet is crucial for the overall development and well-being of children. In a country where 19 crore people go to bed hungry, government schools are equivalent to temples for providing food to poor kids. It is important to provide well-nourished food in order to shape the future generations.
The government is blowing its trumpet stating 72% of the kids are able to concentrate on studies after free school meals and 87% of kids are satisfied with the quality of food. But the CAG report reveals that actual numbers are inflated. Foodgrains are diverted elsewhere, and transportation charges are heavily raised leading to a drop in headcount in schools. This year marks Silver Jubilee of Midday Meal Scheme. It will be a healthy progress for the nation if governments tackle underlying corruption and devotedly implement the scheme.
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