The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal The Mid-Day Meal Programme in Urban Primary and Rural Upper Primary Schools in West Bengal Pratichi (India) Trust February 2010 2 The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal : The Mid-Day Meal Programme in Urban Primary and Rural Upper Primary Schools in West Bengal First Published February 2010 © Pratichi (India) Trust Pratichi (India) Trust Chair: Amartya Sen Managing Trustee: Antara Dev Sen Registered Office A 708, Anandlok, Mayur Vihar I Delhi 110091 Pratichi Research Team 76, Uttar Purbachal Road, Kolkata 700078 Phone +91 33 24844229 Fax +91 24843205 E mail: [email protected] Santiniketan Project Office “Sujan”, Deer Park, Santiniketan, 731235 Edited by A J Philip Publication support: Sarva Siksha Mission, Birbhum Photo Credit : Pratichi Research Team Cover Design : Sanjay Chatterjee Printed at S.S. Print, Kolkata 700 009 3 The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal The Mid-Day Meal Programme in Urban Primary and Rural Upper Primary Schools in West Bengal STUDY TEAM Manabesh Sarkar Paromita Haldar Santabhanu Sen Arabinda Nandy Kumar Rana (Co-ordination) ASSISTANCE Saumik Mukherjee Debajyoti Bose Sumanta Paul 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Amartya Sen Antara Dev Sen A J Philip Dinesh K Bhatt Gautam Ghosh Sukumar Roy Manoj Dey Pallav Goswami Saumitra Sengupta Parthendu Chakar-Kriti Mukherjee Kiriti Mukherjee All Bengal Primary Teachers’ Association West Bengal Primary Teachers’ Association Department of School Education, Government of West Bengal Kolkata Municipal Corporation Kolkata District Primary School Council Sarva Siksha Mission, Birbhum Authorities of the Study Districs All Our Respondents 5 CONTENTS 1. Introduction 7 2. Implementation of Mid-Day Meal 18 in the Urban Primary Schools 3. Implementation of Mid-Day Meal at the 29 Upper Primary Schools of West Bengal 4. A concluding remark 42 Notes and References 44 Persons met 47 6 7 1. INTRODUCTION The Government of India launched in 1995 a programme called the National Programme of Nutritional Support to Primary Education (popularly known as the Mid-Day Meal Scheme), in which free cooked meal was to be provided to all the children studying in government, local body and government-aided primary schools during all school days. This appears to be the largest school feeding programme in the world. The object of this programme was to give a boost to universalisation of primary education by increasing enrolment, retention and attendance and, simultaneously, meet the nutritional requirements of students in primary classes, as stated by the Government of India1 . Such a programme, however, had been in operation in some of the Indian states. Indeed, Tamil Nadu played a pioneering role in introducing it first in 8,000 selected primary schools in 19562. Notwithstanding the positive impact the Tamil Nadu scheme made on primary education and the Central Government’s announcement, many of the states failed to comply fully with the Central directives. Instead of providing cooked meal to the school children, most of the states distributed three kilograms of foodgrains per child per month. It was only after the landmark order of the Supreme Court on November 28, 2001, directing all State Governments and Union Territories to provide cooked food in every government and government-assisted primary schools that the scenario began to change. The order was issued in connection with a public interest litigation on the right to food initiated by Peoples’ Union for Civil Liberties, Rajasthan. According to this order, “Those Governments providing dry rations, instead of cooked meals, must within three months start providing cooked meals in all government and 8 The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal government-aided primary schools in half the districts of the state (in the order of poverty) and must, within a further period of three months, extend the provision of cooked meals to the remaining parts of the state.”3 . The Supreme Court directed the State Governments and Union Territories to serve prepared Mid-Day Meal in every government and government-assisted primary schools with a minimum content of 300 calories and 8-12 grams of protein, each day of the school for a minimum of 200 days. The Government of West Bengal, ultimately, came up to meet the demands of the Supreme Court and started introducing it from 2003. However, as soon as West Bengal overcame the initial hiccups in complying with the popular demand and the Supreme Court order to implement the programme in every primary school, including the Sishu Shiksha Kendras, the programme spread in the rural areas with remarkable speed. The beginning was made with some 1,100 primary schools in five districts (Murshidabad, Birbhum, Bankura, Paschim Midnapore and Jalpaiguri) in 2003. Subsequently, the programme was extended to other districts. In the initial stages of introduction, there were vigorous debates on the programme. The debates were essentially a conflict between two classes of people, viz., the affluent section and the marginalised and disadvantaged people. While the majority of the Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Muslims and other poor people wanted a cooked Mid-Day Meal for their children in the school, the relatively affluent sections of the society thought this as not only completely unnecessary but also hazardous and harmful to schooling. The Mid- Day Meal Scheme brought forth the social division of West Bengal anew4 . However, despite many resistances, confusions and anxieties, the programme was implemented in the primary schools throughout West Bengal. By 2008-09, 90 per cent of the primary schools have been brought under the fold of this programme.5 Pratichi (India) Trust has been advocating implementation of this programme. In accordance with its findings of studies made on the delivery of primary education in West Bengal in 2001-02, it strongly suggested replacement of dry ration with cooked mid-day meal6 . 9 The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal The Trust carried out two studies on Mid-Day Meal, one in 2004, immediately after the introduction of cooked Mid-Day Meal in West Bengal and the other in 2005-06. There has been tremendous progress in bringing the underprivileged children into the fold of primary schooling. Also, the expansion of the MDM programme to cover almost all rural primary schools and SSKs has had a positive impact on the rate of attendance. The recent Pratichi study on primary education in West Bengal found immense improvement in enrolment and rate of attendance of children after the introduction of MDM in primary schools and SSKs. The implementation of the MDM programme, which is a crucial public intervention, has had a radical impact on the primary schooling system and also on the West Bengal society as a whole. This has been corroborated by our finding, although there are some causes of concern. 7 SOME OF THE MAJOR CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE MID-DAY MEAL PROGRAMME IN THE RURAL PRIMARY SCHOOLS AND SSKS (FROM OUR EARLIER STUDIES ON MID-DAY MEAL) The MDM scheme has not only acted as a catalyst for improving the enrolment and attendance of the children, but has also exerted a positive influence on universalisation of elementary education through eliminating classroom hunger and reducing the gender gap in education. The programme has also contributed successfully towards reducing absenteeism among the teachers. All these factors are closely connected with improvements in schooling which, to a large extent, has been influenced by the Mid-Day Meal programme. It has played a major role in reducing the gap of social distances among children. Many evidences suggest the scope of MDM in identifying and narrowing down the gap. It was reported in many cases that the children defied the mandates of their parents and shared the food together. The programme has also created scope, especially for the rural women, to engage in some sort of income-generating activities. The programme has provided ample opportunity for the parents and local people to get involved with the schooling and take part in the overall governance of the school. It has helped in streamlining the infrastructure facilities of the school such as kitchen shed, tube wells, toilets, classrooms etc. 10 The Pratichi Report on Mid-Day Meal The SSKs are now provided with MDM. This was not the case when we did our first study in 2001-2002. Students of government primary schools were also not provided mid-day meals but they were allocated 3 kgs of rice per student per month. The SSK children were not entitled to even this meagre quantity of rice. In spite of the positive lessons of the programme launched in the rural primary schools and the tremendous necessity of such a programme for the urban primary school children, most of the primary schools in urban areas have not yet been covered under it: the extent of coverage in Kolkata has been, as on March 31, 2009, a meagre 31 per cent (see table-1.1 for details). According to the Additional Secretary, Govt. of West Bengal, the space problem for constructing kitchen sheds in school premises was the main reason for the low coverage of the programme in Kolkata as well as in the urban areas of North and South 24 Parganas8. Whether this was the main reason for such low coverage of Mid-Day Meal in urban areas requires an inquiry. The launching of the programme at upper primary level has actually started, along with other Indian states, in 2008-09.9 So far, about half of the schools (54 per cent to be exact) of upper primary schools have been brought under the fold of the programme.10 Despite the relatively quicker pace of coverage, the programme at the upper primary level has been facing several problems, including occasional interruptions and complete withdrawal in some schools. There seems to be a common link between the problems of implementations of the programme in the urban primary schools and the upper primary schools of rural areas.