BENGALURU: With a view to boost nutrition among children in pre-primary government schools, the Department of School Education Literacy (DSEL) issued an order directing schools to provide eggs, bananas and milk to pre-primary kids in government schools. So far, midday meals, eggs, milk and bananas were provided to children from Class 1 to 10. 

The order stated, “In government schools where pre-primary classes have started already, it is ordered to provide midday meals under the PM-Poshan scheme, milk under Ksheera Bhagya Yojana and eggs or bananas starting from December 1 itself.”

While the Central government pays 60 per cent of the funds for midday meals, 40 per cent is borne by the state government.

However, the entire bill for Ksheera Bhagya Yojana and eggs and bananas is borne by the state government.

The cost of preparing food for each student comes to Rs 6.78, of which the Centre contributes Rs 4.07 and the state provides Rs 2.71. Over 1,98,270 kids are studying in pre-primary schools in Karnataka. 

The order stated that the commissioner, school education department, State Project Director, Samagra Shikshana Karnataka; Director, Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman Yojana and all Zilla Panchayat chief executive officers of the State shall take steps to ensure that adequate, clean and healthy mid-day hot meals, hot milk and supplementary nutritional food are available to all students in pre-primary classes of government schools, and monitor them from time to time. 

Similar to details of other students studying in primary and high schools uploaded to the SATS software, it has been ordered to include all details of pre-primary students also to the same software. The order also stated that 5,000 new pre-primary schools will be started across the state.