BENGALURU: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday said that the order issued by the state government on December 5 will not compensate children who have been deprived of midday meals as schools were shut due to the Covid-19 pandemic. A division bench of Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice S Vishwajith Shetty made this observation after department of primary and secondary education principal secretary S R Umashankar appeared through video conference and explained the steps taken by the government to compensate children.
As the bench was not satisfied with the government’s proposed relief measures, the hearing was adjourned to December 15. “Meanwhile, the government can come out with a better assessment of the quantity of food grains to compensate the children,” the bench added.The bench observed that the compensation should be in true sense but the government order submitted to the court was vague, as there was no specific mention about the quantity of toor dal.