NGO wants Midday Meal Scheme to be implemented to the letter in Nagpur.

The Midday Meal (MDM) scheme is a cause of heartache among education activists in Nagpur. According to the activists, the implementation of the scheme leaves a lot to be desired as it doesn’t currently comply with the prescribed guidelines. According to activist, Shahid Sharif the absence of a coordination committee at the district-level as prescribed by the Supreme Court is missing and hence the monitoring of the scheme was suffering.

Sharif, founder-chairman of an education focussed NGO pointed out that the sheer scale of the MDM project warranted a large army of inspectors just for monitoring the implementation. The committee suggested by the Supreme Court includes members from different segments of the society to ensure that all aspects of the scheme are verified.

Sharif alleges various cases of malpractices and negligence towards hygiene in the implementation of MDM. He shares various instances like one where a school was simply not serving MDM claiming that it was due to lack of supply of rice. He shares another case where it was reported that the raw rice in a school was infested with worms. The education department hotly denied the claim but it was later discovered that the department had quietly changed the lot of rice.

Then there are cases of pilferage which largely go unreported as the perpetrators are generally school staff. Like earlier this month, Sharif’s NGO caught a teacher smuggling rice out of the school. When confronted she agreed that it was in compensation of her unpaid salary. Later, when the school management and education department got involved in the issue she changed her statement claiming that rice was being taken for making idli batter.

Advertisement

Not one to rest, the NGO recently met with collector Sachin Kurve and sought intervention in the matter of pilferage.

* Read the original story on www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com