UP Mid-day Meals: One litre milk diluted with bucket of water for 81 children

Nearly two
months after the ‘namak-roti’ failure at a primary school in Mirzapur district
of Uttar Pradesh, now, a primary school in the tribal area of Sonbhadra
district has been accused of serving adulterated milk to the students under the
mid-day meal scheme on November 27.

As per the
menu of the mid-day meal scheme, prescribed by the Uttar Pradesh government,
tehri and milk are supposed to be given to the students. But the authorities at
the Salai Banwa Primary School in Kota village of the Sonbhadra district
reportedly added a bucket of water to one litre of milk, and served it to 81
children.

When the
matter came to light, the school in-charge initially denied to take the
responsibility. Then, he was seen making excuses. The block education officer
of the area admitted that complaint regarding this incident has been received,
and said that action will be taken after further investigation.

According to
reports, there are 171 students enrolled with this primary school and on
November 27, 81 of them were present.

When asked
if sweaters and shoes have been distributed among the students, Kapoor said,
“Nothing has been given to the children here in primary schools. These primary
schools are located in tribal areas. This school is being run with the help of
shiksha mitras, as most of the schools face shortage of teachers. These shiksha
mitras are also involved by the government in other activities like
door-to-door verification. This is why Sonbhadra stands at number 19 in 101
backward districts of the country.”

Meanwhile,
calls made to the Basic Shiksha Adhikari (BSA) of Sonbhadra and District
Magistrate remained unanswered.

Recently, the Minister of Human Resource Development (HRD) Ramesh Pokhriyal revealed in Lok Sabha that Uttar Pradesh has the highest number of corruption cases in the mid-day meal scheme.

According to Pokhriyal, the government has received 52 complaints about corruption in the implementation of the mid-day meal scheme with Uttar Pradesh recording the maximum number of complaints.