Food For Education

According to the latest statistics released by the Government of India, children constitute over one-third of India’s population of 121 Crore. UNICEF has reported that more than one-third of under-five deaths worldwide are attributable to malnutrition. More than one-third of underweight children in the world live in India. Also, the school dropout rate amongst adolescent girls are as high as 63.5%. Currently, only 10.45 crore children are covered under the Indian Government’s midday meal scheme. Lakhs of children across the nation are deprived of a healthy, wholesome meal daily. In Mumbai alone close to 5 lakh children have no access to meals in schools.

The Mid Day Meal scheme was launched as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme on 15th August 1995, it was revised in 2001 to become a cooked Mid Day Meal Scheme under which every child in every Government and Government aided primary school was to be served a prepared Mid Day Meal The Mid Day Meal scheme is a strategic program to liberate underprivileged children from the bonds of hunger and illiteracy. The program is an initiative of the Government of India and Annamrita Foundation is implementing it, in select schools across Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and West Bengal serving 12Lac meals daily.

Annamrita Foundation is a non-profit, non-religious, non-sectarian charitable trust. Its midday meal program is being implemented in municipal, government aided and non-aided schools for the benefit of underprivileged children. The work is done without any commercial motive and the benefits are available to needy students at large without any discrimination on the grounds of religion, caste, creed or gender.

Since the launch of the program in 2004, Annamrita has set up state-of-the-art kitchens in the above-mentioned states and currently caters over 1 million meals to underprivileged children every day from our kitchens in Tardeo, Mira Bhayander, Palghar, Nigdi, Wada, Aurangabad, Gurgaon, Delhi, Faridabad, Kurukshetra, Palwal, Tirupati, Nellore, Rajahmundry, Kadapa, Ranganara Gadda, Jamshedpur, Jaipur, and Kolkata. Most of the children we serve come from slums and tribal areas. The purpose of implementing this scheme is to support the government in increasing enrollment in these schools, reducing the dropout rate and improving attendance. However, as these are the formative years for the future adult, our nutritious plant-based meals are of prime importance.

• By providing a wholesome nutritious meal during the school lunch hours, the project is addressing the issue of classroom hunger and malnutrition. As a result, there is a significant improvement in school enrollment, attendance and performance of the children
• Healthy meals ensure better attention span, academic progress and reduced dropout rates thereby supporting Education for underprivileged children.
• Sharing the financial responsibility of the underprivileged section. In most of the cases, both the parents are working and the family income is as low as Rs. 5000/-. One full meal is a great incentive for the parents to send the children to school and it shares the financial burden of these parents.
• Serving a common meal to all has been instrumental in helping children unite and rise above cultural and caste differences.