Midday meal scheme for Iskcon opposed

- Midday meal workers criticise the proposed move of the government to terminate the services of cooks and cooking assistants appointed under the midday meal scheme
- Appeal to the government not to entrust the supply of meals to Iskcon and stop the retrenchment

Chittoor: Midday meal workers have taken objection to handing over the task of preparing and distributing midday meals to children in schools across the State to Akshaya Patra Foundation of Iskcon.

The workers questioned the propriety of assigning the job to Iskcon when they were doing it successfully without any problems for several years now. Midday meal workers, led by CITU district president P Chaithanya staged a demonstration in front of the Collectorate here on Monday. Addressing the protesters, Chaithanya alleged that the government decided ‘to assign the job of preparing and distributing midday meals to schools across the State to Akshaya Patra Foundation of Iskcon. He questioned as to what had prompted the government to assign the task to the NGO all of a sudden.

He said that 8,988 midday meal workers in the district would be deprived of jobs if the NGO was to be given the contract of serving midday meals to children in government schools.

District midday meal workers union general secretary Nagamani said that keeping in mind the interests of the schoolchildren and the midday meal workers, the decision to hand over charge of serving midday meals to children to an NGO should be given up, and status quo should be maintained. She said that 6,500 women would lose their jobs in the district, if Akshaya Patra Foundation is given the contract.

The workers later tried to barge into the Collectorate demanding that Collector Siddharth Jain listen to their grievances. Police had to resort to mild lathi-charge against protesters. They took Chaithanya and other workers into custody only to release them later on bail.