The Right to Food Campaign, Odisha on Monday held the School and Mass Education Minister and the department Secretary responsible for the faulty management of the midday meal (MDM) programme in the schools.
At a Press meet here, organisation convener Pradip Pradhan alleged that the State Government has failed to provide qualitative MDM to children. Though the State is regularly issuing guidelines and circulars for better management of the programme, there are a lot of MDM-related issues coming up daily. Without taking stock of the situation, issuing of protocols is a bogus thing to divert public attention, Pradhan added.
He alleged that most of the schools are not getting money in regular intervals to purchase grocery items and that is why the quality of the MDM is decreasing. In most of the schools, rice is not supplied regularly and money comes after three or six months which creates problem to maintain quality.
Monitoring of MDM could not be held at the district or block level at all. Surprisingly, the executing agency is monitoring and working as a grievance redressal agency which is unfortunate. An impartial agency should be appointed for independent monitoring and effective grievance redressal, Pradhan said.
He stated that capacity-building training should be given to the school managing committees which are assigned to supervise the MDM programme according to the Right to Education Act. But the Government has not ensured any training to the committee members and the headmasters are managing the programme in the name of the committee members.
Pradhan said his organisation would move the High Court if the Government fails to resolve the irregularities in the MDM scheme.
Other Right to Food Campaign members including Tapan Padhi, Ashok Das, Khirod Routray and Dibakar Nayak alleged that the MDM is being prepared in unhygienic conditions due to lack of kitchen sheds. According to the RTE Act, the State Commission on Protection of Child Rights should hear the grievances regarding MDM-related problems, but till now a single case has been heard by the commission, they alleged.
The members also demanded social audit of the MDM programme so that the actual causes of faulty management could come to the fore.