PANAJI
It stopped outsourcing preparation of the meals to self help groups and got parents to contribute `100 a month. It has been over two years since the school stopped outsourcing mid-day meals to self-help groups (SHGs). Instead, meals are now prepared in the school by parents who are willing to pay more for better meals.The Goan visited the school at 9 am on a weekday to find three women cooking mid-day meals for the 200-odd school students.School Headmistress Mangala Garde said, “Two years back we stopped outsourcing mid-day meals to the SHG because of poor quality. Children were not taking the meals as a result lot of it was getting wasted, especially shira and pulao.”After monitoring the situation for a while, the Parents-Teachers Association (PTA) intervened and decided to discontinue the meals being supplied by the SHG.“They (PTA) even showed willingness to pay extra buck for better quality,” said School Manager Arundhati Salkar.Presently, three women who are parents of ex-students of the school, prepare meals for nearly 228 students, of which 50 are from primary and 178 from upper-primary section.After the meals are ready, either a teacher or a parent or any staff member tastes it following which the meals are taken to the respective classes and served.“Right from preparing the meals to serving and the cleaning of utensils, these three women take care of everything. We pay them `200 per person based on working days,” informed Salkar.Children are served chana bhaji and pav on Monday, green chana bhaji and chapatti on Tuesday, kabuli bhaji and dosa on Wednesday, masur bhaji and bread on Thursday, vatana bhaji and pav on Friday and Chavli bhaji and chapatti on Saturday. Everyday over 40 kgs of bhaji is prepared to be served to the students.When asked about how they manage finances vis-Ã -vis the quality, Salkar informed, “While the government pays a sum per child, some of the parents pay us additional `100 a month which helps us to provide better quality meals.”Chapattis are procured from a group of parents at `6 per chapatti. Dosas are made from rice sourced free of cost from the Centre while dal is purchased locally. “The cost works out to `3 per dosa. So we manage to provide quality meals to our students,” Salkar explained.While the PTA initially tried giving idli-sambar and pulao, it was discontinued as it did not evoke very good response from the children. Presently, pav bhaji is a hot favourite with students.“Pav bhaji is amongst the favourite but now there is a liking for chapatti too,” informed Salkar. The school has also maintained a register to record the day-to-day details of the mid-day meals.
