THE expense is just Rs2.5bn a year, but it could mean the difference between education and illiteracy for the more than 200,000 students who benefit from the mid-day meal scheme in Punjab. At least 70 per cent of these students are wards of labourers, many of them uneducated, who may not otherwise be keen to send their childrento school. Also, more than 90 per cent of the beneficiary children come from Scheduled Caste or Other Back-ward Class families. Studies in some of the poorest states in India have found significant improvement in the health as well as learning standards of children served by the scheme.

Given the huge benefit and relatively small cost at which it comes, it is shocking that Punjab, the granary of the country, is unable to run the scheme for its children efficiently. Bills of tens of millions are pending in nearly all districts, with grocers and cooks not paid for months. In most schools teachers have been contributing from their pocket to keep the service going, run-ning up dues of thousands in some cases. While sufficient funds not being put aside by the state was bad enough, the government also cites administrative reasons for the delay in payments, which is worse. Just because it cannot manage the clerical affairs of releasing payments is no reason for children to suffer. Many schoolshave already stopped serving meals.

While the cereals for the scheme come free from Food Corporationof India godowns, all other ingredients as well as cooking costs have to be paid from the Rs3.11 per day per child allowance for primary classes, which is due to be increased by nearly 30 paise. It is good that this money is being spent for the purpose, but by any account it is a meagre amount.

No surprise then that the meals contain very little vegetable or protein, which comes essentially from the pulses. The state government has to realise that if a child goes hungry, the teaching effort goes waste too.

-(July 7) =