‘Build kitchens to feed children, not temples’

Gujarat chief minister Anandi Patel on Sunday appealed to people to focus on building centralised kitchens to feed children instead of constructing temples. ‘If we can provide quality food to children under mid-day meal scheme, we can drastically decrease the drop out ratio. I believe that it’s better to build kitchens to feed children than building temples,’ Patel said, inaugurating a fully-automated kitchen, built by an NGO The Akshaya Patra Foundation (TAPF), at Bhadaj village on Sunday. The TAPF-run centralised kitchen, spread across 2 acres, is built at a cost of Rs 15 crore and is hailed as one of the biggest in the country with a capacity of preparing 2 lakh meals within 5 hours with the help of large machines and boilers. ‘Food prepared in this TAPF kitchen will be sent to numerous government-run schools and Anganwadis within the periphery of 100 kms as mid-day meal to school children,’ TAPF official Chanchalpati Dasjee said.

‘Our focus is to build toilets in villages with the help of private firms,’ she said.   ‘My government has already acquired account statements of each and every firm operating in Gujarat to see how much they are giving back to society,’ she said.