Eggs Will Be Served As Part Of The Midday Meal In Karnataka's Seven Districts
Update: 2021-09-03 11:45 IST
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In Karnataka schools, eggs will finally be part of the noon meal menu, albeit in a few districts where pupils are nutritionally deficient. For the next 46 school days, 14,44,322 youngsters from seven districts will be served an egg every day in their noon meals.
Eggs will be included in midday meals for Classes 1 to 8 at government and aided schools in certain areas, prompting a demand from nutritionists for the several years and a year of waiting for the department after getting the Centre's clearance. Underneath the flexifund provision, the central government will covering the full cost of the programme.
According to authorities from the education department, the cost is expected to be Rs 3,953.14 lakh this year.
The agency had hoped to launch the programme in two districts, but the Centre requested that it be expanded to seven. According to officials, instead of supplying pupils eggs for 236 days, the department will only give them for 46 days in these areas.
According to Commissioner of Public Instruction Anbu Kumar, Yadgir, Raichur, Bidar, Ballari, Kalaburagi, Koppal, and Vijaypura will be covered under the scheme. The state had been advised to provide additional nutrition items in aspirational districts as well as those with high prevalence of malnutrition — districts where prevalence of anaemia is higher, as per the National Family Health Survey — in a department meeting with Anita Karwal, secretary, Department of School Education and Literacy (NFHS).
While eggs are a delicate food to integrate into the diet, education authorities from the Dharwad and Kalaburagi districts will travel to Tamil Nadu to observe the scheme's implementation. Whereas the agency plans to raise the amount of days when eggs are supplied to 150 in the coming weeks, eggs are not expected to go along with the state-funded midday meal program for classes 9 to 10.
A vegetarian version is also being developed, and despite requests to the Karnataka Cooperative Milk Producers' Federation Ltd (KMF), no response has been received.
On Thursday, according to the department of pre university education, the PU II examinations for logic, business studies, and chemistry were held for 6,165 students, of which 5,629 were represented in 182 centres across the state.
According to figures from the state's department of elementary and secondary education, 34.83 percent of the state's 10,148 schools have yet to begin offline classes. Additionally, just 63.41 percent of the 8,84,073 Class 9 pupils and 64.99 percent of the 8,79,346 Class 10 students completed offline classes. PU I class students were 67.31 percent in attendance over a week since offline classes resumed.