New Delhi: In a major move aimed at motivating children for going to school, the Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the roll-out of the "PM POSHAN in Schools" scheme that will provide hot cooked meals to students of elementary classes in government and government-aided schools across the country. The decision in this regard was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The new scheme is the modified version of the National Scheme for Mid Day Meal in Schools' popularly known as Mid Day Meal Scheme, which was the flagship programme of the erstwhile Congress-led UPA government.
According to Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur, the existing mid-day meal scheme will be subsumed into the PM Poshan Shakti Nirman scheme with the addition of several new components in it.
"The CCEA, chaired by Prime Minister, has approved the continuation of 'National Scheme for PM POSHAN in Schools' for the five years, from 2021-22 to 2025-26, with a financial outlay of Rs 54,061.73 crore from the central government and Rs 31,733.17 crore from the state governments and union territory administrations," the government said.
"The Centre will also bear the additional cost of about Rs 45,000 crore on food grains. Therefore, the total scheme budget will amount to Rs 1,30,794.90 crore," the government said in a statement.
The PM POSHAN scheme will cover all schoolchildren studying in classes 1-8 of government and government-aided schools. "The scheme will cover about 11.80 crore children studying in 11.20 lakh schools across the country," the statement said, adding that during 2020-21, the Centre invested more than Rs 24,400 crore in the scheme, including a cost of about Rs 11,500 crore on foodgrains.
It's worth mentioning that the Mid-day meal scheme is the second programme after the rural job guarantee scheme — MGNREGA — of the erstwhile Congress regime which has been expanded at a broader level to encourage enrollment of children in schools.
The government has also decided to extend the scheme to students studying in pre-primary or Bal Vatikas of government and government-aided primary schools. Besides, the government said, the concept of Tithi Bhojan, a community participation programme in which people provide special food to children on special occasions/ festivals, will be encouraged extensively. Special provision has also been made for providing supplementary nutrition items to children in aspirational districts and districts with a high prevalence of anaemia under the scheme, while a social audit of the scheme has been made mandatory in all the districts.
"Involvement of Farmers Producer Organisations (FPO) and women self-help groups in the implementation of the scheme will be encouraged. Use of locally grown traditional food items for a fillip to local economic growth will be encouraged," it said.
Cooking competitions will also be encouraged at all levels right from village level to national level to promote ethnic cuisine and innovative menus based on locally available ingredients and vegetables, it said.