MID-DAY MEAL SCHEME
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- The Union government has asked the states and Union Territories to conduct a social audit of the mid-day meal scheme in every district by 30th November 2022.
- Social audit is crucial as it helps in detecting irregularities, siphoning or diversion of funds, and helps state and central authorities to get feedback from the local communities.
Mid-Day Meal Scheme
- The Midday Meal Scheme is a school meal programme in India designed to better the nutritional standing of school-age children nationwide, under the Ministry of Education.
- The programme supplies free lunches on working days for children in primary and upper primary classes in government, government-aided, local body, Education Guarantee Scheme, and alternate innovative education centres, Madarsa and Maqtabs supported under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, and National Child Labour Project schools run by the ministry of labour.
- Serving 120 million children in over 1.27 million schools and Education Guarantee Scheme centres, the Midday Meal Scheme is the largest of its kind in the world.
- The Midday Meal Scheme has been implemented in the Union Territory of Puducherry under the French Administration since 1930.
- In post-independent India, the Midday meal Scheme was first launched in Tamil Nadu, during the early 60s.
- The government of India initiated the National Programme of Nutritional Support to Primary Education (NP-NSPE) on 15 August 1995.
- By 2002, the scheme was implemented in all of the states under the orders of the Supreme Court of India.
- The scheme provides cooked mid-day meals with 450 calories and 12 g of protein to every child at the primary level and 700 calories and 20 g of protein at the upper primary level.
- The name of the scheme was changed to PM-POSHAN (Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman) Scheme, in September 2021, by the Ministry of Education, which is the nodal ministry for the scheme.
- The Central Government also announced that an additional 24 lakh students receiving pre-primary education at government and government-aided schools would also be included under the scheme by 2022.
- The Midday Meal Scheme is covered under the National Food Security Act, 2013.
National Food Security Act, 2013
- The National Food Security Act, 2013 was notified to provide food and nutritional security.
- The objective of the Act is to provide food and nutritional security in the human life cycle approach, by ensuring access to an adequate quantity of quality food at affordable prices for people to live a life with dignity.
- The Act provides for coverage of up to 75% of the rural population and up to 50% of the urban population for receiving subsidized food grains under the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS), thus covering about two-thirds of the population.
- The eligible persons will be entitled to receive 5 Kg of food grains per person per month at subsidized prices of Rs. 3/2/1 per Kg for rice/wheat/coarse grains.
- The existing Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) households, which constitute the poorest of the poor, will continue to receive 35 Kg of food grains per household per month.
- Corresponding to the all-India coverage of 75% and 50% in the rural and urban areas, State-wise coverage is determined by the Central Government.
- The work of identification of eligible households is to be done by States/UTs.
- Pregnant women and lactating mothers and children in the age group of 6 months to 14 years are entitled to meals as per prescribed nutritional norms under Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) and Mid-Day Meal (MDM) schemes.
- Children up to 14 years of age are entitled to nutritious meals as per the prescribed nutritional standards. In case of non-supply of entitled food grains or meals, the beneficiaries will receive a food security allowance.
- Besides meals to pregnant women and lactating mothers during pregnancy and six months after childbirth, such women are entitled to receive maternity benefits of not less than Rs. 6,000.
- The eldest woman of the household age 18 years or above be the head of the household to issue ration cards.
- Grievance redressal mechanism at the District and State levels. States will have the flexibility to use the existing machinery or set up separate mechanisms.
The Parliamentary Committee report on Mid Day Meal Scheme
- A Parliamentary committee raised concern over the ‘under-utilization’ of funds under Mid Day Mean schemes, which are considered the “backbone of education” in the country.
- According to the report, out of the total allocation of Rs 40,576 crore under the Centrally Sponsored Schemes that come under the Department of School Education and Literacy, only Rs 23,572 crore was spent.
- The Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports has directed the Center to identify the factors behind the underutilization.
- The PM-Poshan scheme, under which cooked meals are provided to students in schools, officially covers 11.8 crore children in classes up to class VIII.
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