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THE MID- DAY MEAL PROGRAMME
The links between Social security and education, while well established, are complex as they run in both directions. To access education, children of vulnerable backgrounds, require some form of social security, but education itself is a form of social security against future vulnerabilities. Social security provision for education includes enabling condition for children from socially and economically deprived families to come to school and persist through the education cycle. These range from • making school physically available closer to habitations , • scholarships and other forms of financial incentives, • School meals, • School health plans In India, all of the above, have been part of the government's education policies and programmes, albeit in varying degrees and with varying quality and success. The midday meal programme however, is perhaps the most widely acknowledged best- run social security programme of the government of India for school children. Given India's record on hunger and malnutrition, especially among the children's, the idea of introducing mid day meals in schools thus addresses the twin objectives of improving nutrition, as well as enabling children to come to school and remain there through the day. In fact, mid day meals in schools serve multiple important objectives. Research across the world has established that School meals reduce hunger and malnutrition, increase enrolment, and attendance and improve learning outcomes. Most countries, advanced as well as developing, have some sort of a school meal programmme. In India, the provision of hot cooked meal in schools has a long history starting with Tamil Nadu universalizing the noon meal scheme in 1982, with the Supreme Court making a hot-cooked meal in all government schools a legal entitlement across the country, in 2001. The mid day meal is the first meal of the day for a number of children.
Features of the mid-day meal scheme of India • The programme supplies free lunches on working days for children in primary and upper primary classes in government, government aided, local body, Education Guarantee Scheme, and alternate innovative education centres, Madarsa and Maqtabs supported under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, and National Child Labour Project schools run by the ministry of labour. • Currently, the mid day meal programme in India covers more than 10 crore children across 11.5 lakh schools. • More than 25 lack women mainly from SC/ST /OBC communities are employed as mid day meal cooks and helper in schools.
Social and other benefits arising from the mid-day meal scheme • Improvement in nutritional standards of the children • Improvement in enrolment ratio as well as learning outcomes (as cognition is directly related to health) • Further, it has had other social benefits such as inculcating the practice of all children irrespective of social background eating together, • Involvement of the local community in monitoring the meals and thus increased parental engagement in schools • In some cases local produce is to be used in the meals thereby impacting local economy • Providing employment to women as cooks, helpers etc.
Issues associated with the mid-day-meal • There are gaps in the delivery mechanism, such as irregularity in supply, poor hygiene and infrastructure, inadequate nutritional content of meals etc. • Difficulties in estimating exact number of children using MDMS, etc. • Some have also pointed that far too much time is spent by teachers in organizing the MDM(mid-day-meal) taking away from their core duties of teaching and • That children come to school only for the food, leaving soon after it is served, thus not meeting their educational requirements. • In addition, reports of discrimination on the basic of caste- such as Dalit children being asked to eat separately or not being provided sufficient quantities of food- have been noted too.
Using Biometrics - an evaluation • Recently the government mandated the use of Aadhaar for mid-day meals in schools. The Use of Aadhaar as identity document for delivery of services or benefits or subsidies simplifies the government delivery processes, bring in transparency and efficiency. • It is supposed to weed out ghost beneficiaries and ensure economy in the scheme. Also it will prevent the misuse of funds by organisers in the name of ghost beneficiaries. • Additionally the move will ensure that the students who are not yet enrolled for Aadhaar will be enrolled so that they can reap other associated benefits as well.
Criticism of the move • The UID with scores of children without an Adhaar card, what this implies is that the simplification sought will be in the form of limiting the number of children that can access MDMs, rather than improve access. • The move does not affect the irregularities in supply poor hygiene and infrastructure or inadequate nutritional content of meals. • Also, it amounts to violation of right to opt for Aadhaar as children are not mature enough to make a conscious decision of getting involved in biometric programme that might compromise on their privacy.
Conclusion While mandating Aadhaar is good move, it should be ensured that it is made mandatory only once all the students have been enrolled under Aadhaar. Meanwhile, there are known techniques to increase accountability in mid day meals such as through programmes of community monitoring, social audits, decentralized grievance redress systems, Public display of information on beneficiaries and menu, etc. Other latest initiatives in the field of education
EXPANSION OF EDUCATION FACILITIES
? 10 AIIMS to be set up in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Poorvanchal in UP, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and Bihar. ? Increase in Medical Seats for both Under Graduate (UG) and Post Graduate (PG)courses. ? Under- Graduate Seats increased From 54,348 in 2014-15 to 65183 in 2016-17 ? Medical Post- Graduation seats increased from 25,346 in 2014-15 to 36,703 in 2017-18.
ISHAN UDAY ? Special Scholarship Scheme for Promotion of Higher Education in North Eastern Region (NER). ? Scholarship of rs 5, 400/- Per month for General Degree courses; rs 7,800/- Per month for technical and Professional degree Courses ? 10,000 Candidates selected under the scheme for NER
RESEARCH & QUALITY_-HIGHER EDUCATION ? 600 startups of students stared in 44 campuses with 5 year incubation period ? 258 research projects worth Rs 596 crore approved in unique scheme IMPRINT (Impacting Research Innovation and Technology ) ? Interested subsidy on education loan offered to 4.4 lakh students worth Rs 2,290 crore in last 3 years SANKALP ? SANKALP to provide market relevant training to 3.5 crore youth SWAYAM ? Free online virtual learning platform created for students to enable "Any-Time, Any-Where" learning ? Course content from school learning to post graduate learning to be available on this platform along with mobile apps. (Related Article - Nurturing a Healthy Learning Environment, Page - 55 by Kiran Bhatty)
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