Bhubaneswar: With the schools remaining shut till end of August in view of Covid-19 pandemic, the state government has decided to distribute food security allowances to students covered under Mid Day Meal (MDM) scheme till August end.
School and Mass Education (S&ME) department has asked the MDM state nodal officer to provide food security allowance including dry ration and cooking cost for 57 days starting from June 14 to August 31, 2020, to the eligible students. Earlier, the government had distributed such allowance to the school students for the March 16-June 13 period.
“While headmasters of schools will look after the distribution of rice to the students, payment of cooking cost for the 57 days will be transferred to their parents’ or guardians’ bank accounts,” the letter read.
The government has also asked the headmasters to explore options to sell the MDM rice to quarantine centres at Rs 32 per kg and deposit the money with the District Education Officer (DEO).
In case of schools having MDM rice for more than 57 days, the excess rice will be diverted to the nearby schools having deficit MDM rice.
As the school buildings were being used as quarantine centres, the government instructed the concern officials to sanitise the vacated building and use it as a distribution centre of food security allowance.
In case the building has not been vacated so far, proper arrangements should be made to take away the MDM rice to the nearby school or community centre and use the same as food security allowance distribution centre, the department said.
The government further instructed the officials to follow all Covid-19 safety norms like face masking, hand sanitising, social distancing during the transportation and dry ration rice distribution.