An online monitoring system has been developed for monitoring the mid-day meal scheme in Chhattisgarh as per the prescribed guidelines of the Union Ministry of Human Resources Development, State School Education Minister Brijmohan Agarwal said on Thursday.
The online system assists in gathering of data on the number of children getting benefitted from the mid-day meal scheme. For this, the ‘log in’ for the online system had been provided to the offices of the District Education Officer and the Block-level Education Officer, the Minister informed in an official statement here.
He said that the details on ‘cooking cost’ and the honorarium to be paid to the cooks is provided to the District Education Officer for proper monitoring of the mid-day meal scheme.
Agarwal said that the necessary directives to the concerned district education officers had been issued on details of first instalment of expenditure made through the online monitoring system.
The officers had also been directed that the payment to the Self Help Groups (SHGs) be made only on the basis of the number of children having food cooked under mid-day meal scheme.
It may be mentioned that the State government had released the first instalment of the cooking cost and the honorarium to be paid to the cooks amounting to more than Rs125.53 crore for 2013-14 under the mid-day meal scheme operated by the School Education Department in primary and pre-primary schools in Chhattisgarh.
Out of the total amount released to cover the cooking cost and the payment of honorarium, Rs75.13210 crore had been released for primary schools and Rs50.40 crore for pre-primary schools under the scheme.
The aforesaid amount had been released in 14 districts mainly — Raigarh, Janjgir-Champa, Bilaspur, Kabirdham, Rajnandgaon, Durg, Mahasamund, Dhamtari, Baloda Bazar, Gariyaband, Mungeli, Balod, Bemetara and Raipur. The amount had been released for government schools having classes from First to Eight Standard under State School Education Department, aided schools, madarsas, schools for children of labourers, schools in the civic wards and alternative schools.
Under the first instalment released for various districts, Raigarh district received Rs5.8271 crore, Janjgir-Champa (Rs13.65370 crore), Bilaspur (Rs13.83110 crore), Kabirdham (Rs8.42100 crore), Rajnandgaon (Rs11.09340 crore), Durg (Rs8.85780 crore), Mahasamund (Rs9.390400 crore), Dhamtari (Rs5.12260 crore), Baloda Bazar (Rs13.108100 crore), Gariyaband (Rs2.49180 crore), Bemetara (Rs8.16180 crore) and Raipur (Rs15.80340 crore).