Ready to serve millets in midday meal if govt supplies: Akshaya Patra

The Akshaya Patra Foundation
is ready to serve millets - which has high nutritional value - under the midday meal programme if the government allocates the grains, its CEO Shridhar Venkat said. Currently, the NGO is feeding 1.6 million children every day under the midday meal programme in 12 states. Mostly, wheat and rice-based hot cooked meals are served. "We believe that children should get nutritious food, which has an impact on the lives of beneficiaries. So, we are serving millet-based food items on a pilot basis under the midday meal programme in some states," Venkat told PTI. Inclusion of millets like 'jowar', 'bajra' and 'ragi' as one of the components of the midday meal will help enhance the nutritional intake of primary school children, he said.

Venkat said Akshaya Patra is serving millet-based food items on a trial basis for three months in few schools in Bengaluru in partnership with state government and Hyderabad-based International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT). "We have done similar pilots in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana as well. If the government gives millets along with wheat and rice, we will be glad to implement millets as one of the components to the meal," he said. Already, millet-based recipes have been developed as per the regional palate of the children. For instance, a recipe for preparing 'Bisi bele bath' from millets is ready for Karnataka, he added. Besides millets, Akshaya Patra is serving fortified rice to 4 lakh children in Gujarat and Karnataka to ensure nutritious meals. It plans to serve fortified rice under the midday meal programme across the country. Currently, Akshaya Patra is reaching out to 1.5 per cent of India's school-going population. It plans to expand in Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, NCR, Puducherry and many other places to reach out to 5 million children by 2020.