Midday Meals: A Long Way to Go

Despite the numerous promises and provisions, the Midday Meal program remains a non-starter. According to an article in the Telegraph, only 128 of the 1134 primary schools (a little over 10 per cent) of the Kolkata Primary School Council have cooked midday meals. Is this how it was expected to turn out, seven years after its implementation?

The startling news is that it is not the implementation of the MDM that poses the direct problem. Rather, it is the high dropout rate emerging from it that forms the crux of the problem. In the face of non-availability of meals in the schools, the children from socio-economically strata of the society have no choice but to turn to child labour in order to survive. As expected, studies reveal that girls’ school participation has been found to be 15 per cent higher in schools that provide MDM than in those that do not.

It is a classic case of a vicious circle where the non implementation of the MDM leads to depleting number of students in the schools which in turn leads to shutting down of these schools thereby bringing about the complete failure of the government’s ‘education for all’ plan.

A recent study by the Pratichi (India) Trust notes that more than two-thirds of primary schools in calcutta remain uncovered. In the words of the government officials themselves, Calcutta is a “laggard” district with MDM lacking in almost 70 per cent of its schools.

The few schools that do provide the meals do not provide nutritious and healthy food. The problem has its roots in rented school sites with limited space for cooking, rising costs of essential commodities, absence of community participation and delay in fund release from the Centre.

If the government has any hopes of overhauling the state of education in the country, its time they realize that only the successful implementation of the MDM scheme can bring about this much needed change.

For the original article, see the story in media:

Midday Meal Maladies

Sonam Chamaria

CRY Volunteer