Mid day meal under Mid Day Meal Scheme was served to 9.78 crore children on an average basis on every working day in 11.43 lakh schools in 2016-2017. The quality of mid-day meals has been a matter of concern for the public. There have been regular reports in the media regarding unhygienic and inadequate food served in the schools.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) in a report tabled in the Parliament on 18 December 2015 found the quality of food served in schools under the Mid Day Meal Scheme to be poor across the country. The CAG found that “Cases of cooking of poor quality meals in unhygienic conditions, inadequate and poor quality of infrastructure in terms of kitchen sheds and utensils were rampant across all states exposing children to health hazards.”
Yet, while responding to Unstarred Question No. 2157 in the Rajya Sabha on 3 August, Shri Upendra Kushwaha, Minister of State in the Ministry of Human Resources Development stated that only 72 complaints on the substandard quality of food served to the children were reported from various States and Union Territories from 2015 to 2017. These included 46 in 2015, 21 in 2016 and 5 so far in 2017.
The highest number of complaints during 2015-2017 were received in Uttar Pradesh (19 complaints) followed by Bihar (9), Maharashtra and Delhi (7 each), Jharkhand (4), Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and West Bengal (3 each), Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab (2 each), and Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Chandigarh, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, J&K, Tamil Nadu, Telangana & Tripura (1 each).
The response of the minister itself suggests that complaints redressal mechanism is not working. Out of 72 complaints filed during 2015-2017, the Ministry of Human Resources Development has not received reply from the state governments/UTs in 32 cases i.e. 44.4% of the total complaints. Interestingly, out of these 32 cases where the Ministry has not received responses from the States/UTs, 14 complaints belong to the year 2015, 13 complaints to the year 2016 and 5 complaints of the current year (2017). In addition, two complaints registered in 2015 are still under investigation at state level as of today.
Departmental action (including warning, transfer, suspension) and action against service providers were taken only in 18 out of 46 cases in 2015 and 8 out of 21 cases in 2016. Corrective actions including issuing of instructions to the concerned were taken in seven complaints during 2015-2017.
Mr Kushwaha told the Rajya Sabha that the Government of India made various efforts to improve the quality of mid-day meal such as issuing guidelines on food safety and hygiene for school level kitchens under Mid Day Meal Scheme on 13 February 2015; safe storage and supply of ingredients to schools; procurement of pulses and ingredients of branded and Agmark quality; mandatory tasting of meals by 2-3 adult members including at least one teacher before serving to children and testing of food samples by accredited/Govt. recognized laboratories etc.
In addition, the Central Government has adopted an elaborate monitoring mechanism at Central, State and District levels to curb malpractices and to ensure the quality of food served under the scheme. Further, the Centre constitutes Joint Review Missions (JRMs) consisting of educational and nutritional experts, which review the scheme through field visits from time to time. The reports of JRMs are shared with concerned States/UTs for taking corrective action on the findings.
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