Ranipet gears up to ensure success of free breakfast scheme

RANIPET: The district administration is gearing up to implement the breakfast scheme in all primary schools in teh district and make it a grand success, said Collector S Valarmathi. Chief Minister MK Stalin announced the extension of the scheme to all primary schools across the state in the Assembly from this academic year.

Conveying this to DT Next, she said, “We are taking all steps to ensure that from June 1, breakfast is served to all children in 620 primary schools in the district. This includes 538 primary schools in rural areas and 41 each in municipal and town panchayat areas.”

A high-level coordination meeting held at the Collector’s office on Wednesday reviewed the preparations in this regard. Officials said that rice, sugar and oil would be provided by the TN Civil Supplies Corporation and ingredients like red chilies, wheat, rava, mustard and pepper would be supplied by the cooperative department.

Work is underway to ensure that cooking sheds in the schools are in good condition. DRDA (District Rural Development Agency) project director G Loganayagi said, “A total of 202 cooking sheds would be repaired while another 82 schools would be provided with new sheds under two categories.” Unlike noon meals, which have separate staff for cooking, the breakfast scheme envisages cooking by self-help groups (SHG). Mahalir Thittam project director Nanilathasan said, “SHGs have already been chosen through the panchayat level federation (PLF) from 879 groups, including 41 in urban areas. Three women from each chosen SHG will cook the breakfast.”

Officials said that after work for breakfast was completed, SHG members would clear the sheds for the noon meal staff to prepare food for their wards.

A total of 36,022 children would benefit from the scheme in the district, officials added.