Mid-day meal dispute resolves in Champawat's school

DEHRADUN: The controversy over some students of Class 6 to 8 refusing to take mid-day meal at the Government Secondary School in Sukhidhang area of Tanakpur in Champawat district is now resolved, a senior official said on Saturday Champawat Chief Education Officer Jitendra Saxena told PTI on Saturday that the parents of the students in front of the district's high officials, including the District Magistrate, said that the reason for the children's refusal to eat mid-day meal was not caste, but their dislike for rice.

Saxena said that the District Magistrate of Champawat, the Sub-Collector of Tanakpur and he himself had gone to the school on Friday, where the parents of the children of Classes 6 to 8 were also called and asked the reason for the refusal of food. The Champawat Chief Education Officer said that the parents said that their children do not eat rice even at home, while pulses, vegetables and rice are available in the mid-day meal.

“We explained to the children that if they do not eat rice, then eat pulses and vegetables, but sit and eat food with everyone in school. We officials also sat down and ate food with the school principal and children," he said. The official said the matter was not caste-based and the matter was exaggerated. He said that the children are not refusing to eat the food cooked by the Dalit 'bhojanmata' (cook), but the reason for their refusal is their lack of desire to eat rice. He told that there are nine such children, mostly girls.

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Five of these children enrolled in Class 6 only last month. Saxena said that the District Magistrate has said that at present the code of conduct is in force in the district due to the by-elections and after its removal, it will be reviewed again to see how much impact the explanation had on the children. In December last year too, there was a dispute in the school over the mid-day meal, when children allegedly refused to eat food cooked by the Dalit 'bhojanmata'. In this regard, Saxena said that in reaction to the refusal by the general category students to eat food cooked by the Scheduled Caste 'bhojanmata' Sunita Devi, the SC students had refused to eat food cooked by the general category 'bhojanmata' Vimala Devi. Saxena also denied reports that the names of such students were cut from the school. He said that no child's name has been removed from the school, the principal had only pretended to issue TC to scare the children. It was also told that the Principal has been instructed not to do this in future.

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