Dinesh Kamath's news 'Improve the quality of the midday meal, say parents of the students of NMMC schools' that was published in Newsband

Improve the quality of the midday meal, say parents of the students of NMMC schools

By Dinesh Kamath

NAVI MUMBAI: A few weeks back there was a case of worms having been found in the midday meal of students at a Digha civic school. Many parents of the students have not forgotten this incident and they fear that such a thing might happen again and put the health of their wards in danger. One of these parents, while speaking to this newspaper, said, “It is not enough to serve midday meals to students but the food served should be of reasonably good quality.”

“The ingredients that are used to prepare these meals should be of standard quality and each ingredient should be used in right quantity while preparing the meal. In fact, how much of which ingredients should be used has been specified by the government. But it is found that the staff of some Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation’s schools are not following the guidelines set up by the government,” he added.

Another parent of a student said, “Students who consume these meals cannot be expected to raise objection since they are unaware about their rights. These students are forced to consume the meals served to them in order not to invite the wrath of the school management.  

When bad meals are served to the students and when it comes to the notice of the authorities of Municipal Corporation, it is necessary to find out details about the catering staff to whom the contract has been given to prepare the meals. If the contractors are found to be playing mischief then they should be replaced by new catering people. These caterers could be serving inferior meals to rake in more profit for themselves.”  

Parent of still another student said, “When we lodged a complaint relating to this with the NMMC authorities, we were told that such a thing could not have happened especially when the corporation sends their officers to school daily to check the quality of food. If the food contained worms then the catering staff to whom the contract for preparing the meals has been awarded should not have been given their payment as per one of the clauses in the contract.”

The news about 24 boys in a Mumbai school having been admitted to hospital after consuming midday meal served to them has sent another shock wave among the parents of NMMC school students. These students, after consuming the ‘Khichdi’ served by their school started vomitting and exhibiting symptoms like stomachache and nausea.

“Precautionary steps should be taken immediately to prevent occurrence of such shocking incidents in Navi Mumbai too,” said one of the shocked parents of the city.

A general medical practitioner said, “When there is a case of inferior meals served to students, the authorities of the school should be prepared with antibiotics and other fluids. If the students happened to have consumed the food, they should be immediately sent to hospital for observation. The samples of the food should be sent to laboratory for analysis. Complaint against the catering staff members who prepared the meal should be lodged with the Food and Drug Administration. Such precautionary measures can prevent such incidents from happening again.”