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Written By: Admin | Updated : July 25, 2013 5:19 PM IST
Millions of school children, mostly the poorest of the poor, in Bihar were not served their mid-day meal on Thursday as 300,000 school teachers began a boycott of the scheme. Ignoring the state government's appeal to continue their participation in the mid-day meal scheme, teachers began their boycott Thursday. Ten days after the death of 23 children from eating a contaminated mid-day meal in Saran district, teachers are in no mood to assist the government in running the scheme.
Bihar State Primary Teachers' Association president Barajnandan Sharma said the teachers have boycotted the scheme. 'With teachers staying away from the preparation and distribution of the mid-day meal, hundreds of thousands of children did not get it,' he said. Bihar mid-day meal director R. Lakshamanan admitted that due to the teachers' boycott, millions of children will return from school without having food. 'We had appealed to the teachers to cooperate in running this scheme,' Lakshamanan told IANS. In view of teachers demand to hand over the scheme to NGOs or some other agency, Akshay Patra, a charitable organization, had been invited to take it over in Patna and Muzaffarpur districts.
Soon after association announced its boycott of the scheme, Bihar Education Minister P.K. Shahi said it was difficult to arrange for an agency to run the scheme in 72,000 schools across the state. 'The government does not have the resources to hire an agency for the huge task of serving mid day meals to 1.60 crore students,' Shahi said.
Last Saturday, a forensic science laboratory report confirmed the presence of toxic insecticide strains in the cooking oil used for making food at the school where the children died. The poisonous substance, organophosphorus, in oil samples collected from school was more than five times the commercial preparation available in the market, police said. Organophosphorus compounds are degradable organic compounds containing carbon-phosphorus bonds used primarily in pest control.
Meanwhile, tadpole found in UP midday meal
A tadpole was found in the mid-day meal served to students at a primary school in Moradabad, an official said on Thursday. 'Tahri' (cooked rice) was served Wednesday at the Tikhunti primary school in Dilari area and one of the girl student's spotted a fried tadpole in her plate. She promptly raised an alarm and fled the school to tell her parents. As angry villagers came to the school, the principal and the three cooks employed to cook mid-day meal for students locked the school rooms and fled.
A sub-divisional magistrate was sent to the school to look into the incident. In his initial findings, the SDM found the complaint to be correct as the villagers handed over the tadpole to him.
After this, the district magistrate Thursday ordered a probe and asked the chief development officer to conduct an inquiry.
The absconding principal has been sacked and the services of the cooks terminated. 'We have taken stern and swift action in the case and I would like to assure that no carelessness will be tolerated in the mid-day meal scheme,' an official said. Following the Bihar tragedy earlier this month when 23 school children died after consuming poisonous mid-day meal, the state government issued a second advisory Thursday asking the district magistrates and divisional commissioners to continuously monitor the mid-day meal scheme and to personally ensure that hygiene was maintained at school pantries. The advisory also warns that in case any incident of food poisoning or poor quality food in mid-day meal is found, the local authorities will face penal action.
