BHUBANESWAR: The Ministry of Education has asked the state government to inspect schools for checking mid-day meal (MDM) quality and examine MDM coverage in districts that have been consistently claiming very high coverage throughout the academic year.
The project approval board (PAB) of PM POSHAN has asked the government to verify coverage of MDM in 8 districts - Mayurbhanj, Malkangiri, Jajpur, Puri, Balangir, Jagatsinghpur, Keonjhar and Kalahandi.
In 2024-25 academic session, while the state reported an average of 92 per cent (pc) of MDM coverage against enrolled students in primary and upper-primary grades, Malkangiri, Jajpur, Puri and Mayurbhanj reported 100 pc coverage, Balangir 99 pc, Jagatsinghpur 97 pc and Keonjhar and Kalahandi 96 pc each throughout the year.
Following a PAB meeting recently, secretary of department of School Education & Literacy under the ministry, Sanjay Kumar asked to verify the coverage and ascertain the real picture on the ground.
From November last year to June this year, both the state and the Centre revised the material cost of MDM thrice. Prior to that, though, school managements had to manipulate students’ attendance to meet the MDM costs, sources said. “Over-reporting of MDM was perhaps the only option to adjust the rising prices of commodities required to cook MDM,” said a primary teacher, requesting anonymity.
The PAB also expressed concern over low utilisation of funds (only 61 pc) meant for management, monitoring and evaluation of MDM by the state. It advised the state government to ensure full and optimal utilisation of funds meant for the purpose in the new academic session.
Besides, the district-level monitoring and school inspection for MDM has been pending in many districts. The meeting revealed that the state reported just 15 meetings of district committees on MDM, which is held under the chairmanship of the local MP, in just eight out of 30 districts in the last academic session. Also, 45 meetings of the district steering-cum-monitoring committee under chairmanship of district collectors were held in just 10 districts in the same period.
As far as school inspections are concerned, the department cautioned the state government that in many instances, only the conveniently located schools have been visited for monitoring purposes and those located in difficult terrains are rarely visited. It advised the state to put in a robust and foolproof mechanism to ensure that all schools are visited by officials concerned at least twice in a year to check the quality of MDM being served to children.