JAMSHEDPUR: Lizards and insects emerging out of midday meals will now be a thing of the past for 65,000 children studying in government schools in and around Jamshedpur, India

Come April 9 and their meals will roll out from delivery vans packed in shining steel utensils containing ‘dal bhat and subzi’ cooked in huge semi-automatic steam cookers at a centralized kitchen.

Built as a public-private-partnership model of the state government with Tata Steel and Iskcon Food Relief Foundation (IFRF), this centralized kitchen is the brainchild of chief minister Arjun Munda who was impressed with Iskcon’s centralized kitchen in New Delhi one and a half years back and hit upon the idea of implementing it back home. While Tata Steel provided the infrastructure, including land, for the purpose, IFRF, which has 25 such kitchens across the country, sent out its representatives to conduct a survey of government schools across Jamshedpur and Adityapur and assess its requirements.

“I was aghast to see the kind of meals that were being served to the children which not only lacked both quality and quantity but were cooked under highly unhygienic conditions,” said the kitchen team leader, Ramesh Kumar. Not surprising then that children often fell sick after lizards were found in their dal and insects swarmed in the rice that was served to them in the name of midday meals.

Not any more. “As many as 16 women of neighbouring localities have been engaged to clean the rice which is provided by the government,” said IFRF director Sanjay Tikoo, who has been camping here for the past one year. The vegetables will be cut automatically in an electrical vegetable chopper from where it will go straight to the cooker after proportionate amount of salt and spices are added to it by 20 cooks brought in by Iskcon. The cooked meal will be poured straight into the containers in which they would be parcelled. “The first hand that touches the meal will be that of the person in the school who will serve the meal to the children; hence no chances of contamination,” said Tikoo.

While the government is providing Rs 3.40 per meal per child, the rest will be provided by IFRF. “We are making no profits; this is simply charitable work,” said Tikoo.

Behind him, four huge steel cookers with capacity to cook 90 kg of vegetables and 70 kg of rice at a time stood ready to roll from Monday when Iskcon will have its trial run of the kitchen. “Everything will be steam cooked,” said Kumar, adding that the thrust of IFRF was to provide nutritional food to the children. At present, the schools are running in morning shift and work at the kitchen would begin at 5 am and by 7 am the 22 vehicles would roll out of the centre to their destination of 388 schools. “During day schools, the meals will be ready to be delivered between 9.30 am and 10 am,” said Kumar.

Read more: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-04-07/ranchi/31304311_1_centralized-kitchen-midday-meals-iskcon-food-relief-foundation