Students prefer home-cooked meals over mid-day meals.

Government school students bring their lunch from home despite meals being served at school.

Students of several government schools in Bangalore bring their lunch from home despite meals

being served at school. Aksa, a student of 8th standard does not like eating the mid-day meal

served in the school because it doesn’t really taste good. “I get my tiffin from home. My friends

do not eat the meal served in school as well.”

The meals that get served at several government schools in Bengaluru lack variety. Students also

complain of the quality of the mid-day meals being served at school. Mehak, a student of V K

Obaidulla Government School in Shivajinagar, said, “The food is not good here. I do not like the

taste of the food. I’ll not eat it. At times, only when I’m extremely hungry, I eat the meal.”

The mid-day meal scheme guidelines to provide meals with 450 calories and 12 g of protein to

every child at primary level and 700 calories and 20 g of protein at the upper primary level. Anis

Fatima, supervisor of the food department at the school said, “We serve pulao as meals;

however, the food gets wasted. When kids see food items as pulao served on Saturdays, most of

them don’t turn up and avoid coming to the dining halls. The taste of the food is not good and

hence the kids waste their meals. Previously they were provided with bananas and other fruits,

now they have stopped giving that as well. The milk served also smells at times.”

VK Obidullah School in Shivajinagar is one of the government schools in Bengaluru with the

strength of 1033 students studying. The school gets its mid-day meal supplies from the ISKCON

temple. Emmanuvel, Principle of VK Obidullah school, said, “Iskcon supplies the food; the

quality of the food is not good. We expect good quality food for our students. The government is

avoiding responsibility by giving the tenders to NGOs. Eggs are completely restricted. It is good

for health but they don’t supply. Milk and eggs are required for children suffering from health

issues.”

Ministry of Human resource and development introduced the mid-day meal scheme to enhance

enrollment and retention of students in schools as well as to improve nutrition levels among

children. Gaurav Venkatesh, advisor of Karnataka Education Ministry said, “The food quality is

good. We have given the contract to Iskcon and Ananya and they are capable of serving at heavy

scale and the quality of the food is also good.”

Dr. Rashmi Gunny said, “The food should be a balanced diet with more of protein in it. The ways

these foods are being cooked affect the quality of the food. A boiled egg is good for health and

kids should consume it. Pulses can also be served as protein. For kids, the food should be tasty

enough for them to consume it. At times the food is overcooked as well.”

Though the meals served in these government schools are meeting their nutritional requirement;

due to lack of variety and taste, the students prefer not to eat it.