Mid-day meal programme runs into trouble

In a letter to the District Magistrate, the village heads have urged the administration to provide subsidised LPG cylinders to government schools failing which they will stop providing mid-day meals to children from October 15.

"We cannot purchase cylinders for over Rs 1,100 given the tight budget," they have written.

"Village heads get Rs 3.11 per child in primary school and Rs 4.65 per child in junior high school. In the given budget, we need to provide mid-day meals to students of class 1 to 8 every day," President, Gram Pradhan Sangh, Balendra Singh told PTI.

"The mid-day meal is getting costlier with the price hike. Till now, we used to get the cylinder for Rs 400 but spending Rs 1,100 for the same now will not be possible and we will not be able to provide meals to students," Singh said.

He said the price of commodities has been increasing at a very fast pace, however, the budget for the programme has not been increased.

HRD Minister Kapil Sibal had recently said the issue will be "certainly" addressed.

In a letter to Petroleum Secretary G C Chaturvedi last month, Additional Secretary in the HRD Ministry Amarjit Singh had requested that instructions be issued to public sector oil marketing companies for supply of LPG cylinders to schools for mid day meal scheme at subsidised rates.