Uttar Pradesh government admitted in the State Assembly on Tuesday that 42 per cent school-going children were under nourished in the state and steps were being taken to provide nutritious food to these children. Primary Education Minister Ram Govind Chaudhury said in reply to a question of BJP member Radha Mohan Das Agarwal that medical check up of students were carried out twice in which 42 per cent students were found under nourished. He said affected students were given vitamin and folic acid tablets. He said that between October and December this year, 7602900 students of 112845 schools were given these tablets. “To address these undernourished children government has set up Nourishment Mission which has started working in the identified districts,” he said.
However, Minister could not reply reason of such a high rate of undernourished children and what kind of deficiency they are having. To an another question the Minister said all the children were given free text books since 2005-06. When Dr laksmi Kant Bajpai (BJP) asked action government had taken against those publishers who violate government orders the minister said till now there was no provision to blacklist them but from now on the erring publishers will be black listed.
State’s Debt: Government claimed that though the state’s debt burden was over Rs 2.65 lakh crore it was well under control. Replying to a question in the state Assembly Dairy Development Minister Ram Murti Verma said that till March 31total loans stand at Rs 2,95,770 crore from the Centre and different institutions. “Government has paid Rs 18,636.80 crore as interest against this loan during 2014-15,” he said. He said after state has adopted Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act since 2004 the debt of the state was well under control. “During 2013-14, the debt was 28.3 per cent of the Gross Domestic State Product (GDSP) which came down to 27.8 per cent in 2014-15 and in the next fiscal it could be 27.5 per cent,’’ he said. Verma said the state has the authority to take loan up to 41.9 per cent of GDSP, but it just 27 per cent of GDSP.