Defying Centre, KMC to provide midday meals without Aadhaar

Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will continue to give midday meal to students in its schools, flouting the Centre's order to make Aadhaar cards mandatory for students to get the provision, Mayor Sovan Chatterjee said on Monday.

"The Central government has taken an irrational decision of linking Aadhaar card with midday meals. We will give midday meals to our students as usual," he said, adding that "KMC will just ignore the order and continue to give midday meal to students."

Senior civic officials said they have been instructed to carry on with the midday meal scheme as usual. There are 263 KMC schools in the city with total students' strength of 26,971.

It may be mentioned that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had on March 4 tweeted in criticism of the Centre's decision, saying that "people from economically challenged background will face major problem due to this inhuman decision.

"Now even infants (0-5 years) will need Aadhar cards? Aadhaar cards for midday meal and ICDS? Shocking? 100 Days' work also not spared," Baneje tweeted.

Meanwhile, Trinamool Mahila Congress workers on Monday took out a rally to protest against the linking of Aadhaar cards with midday meal.

The rally began from Raja Subodh Mullick Square and ended at Rani Rashmoni Avenue.

Chandrima Bhattacharya, the women's wing president, said it was absurd to link Aadhaar cards with midday meals.

"If one has to follow the order of Central government, then sex determination of those in mother's womb will have to be made. This is illegal and Centre has asked every state to follow this illegal practice.

"If a photograph of a one-year-old child is taken and he or she is given Aadhaar card, how many times will one have to change the Aadhaar card as the face will continuously change till he or she becomes an adult. This is absurd," Bhattacharya said.

CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty said the Centre's decision was discriminatory. "Can the Centre discriminate between two students and give midday meal to one just because he has a ration card and deprive the other as he does not have it? This is clear discrimination and cannot be supported," he stated.

It may be mentioned that the KMC schools were started by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, when he was the mayor.