Panchkula: Bugs found in mid-day meal ration, incharge suspended

Panchkula, July 9

Haryana Assembly Speaker and Panchkula MLA Gian Chand Gupta suspended a school incharge after identifying expired and bad-quality food given to students in the school. The MLA visited the government school in Mankian village, where he found the wheat flour was full of bugs and the shelf life of milk had expired.

Speaker Gupta said that he had been informed that students of a few schools in the area were being provided poor quality food and in some cases expired products were used in mid-day meal.

He said, “We came here and checked the situation on the ground. The milk stock at the school in Mankian village has expired since June. The wheat flour and rice stock at the school expired in March this year. The ration was also found to be full of bugs.”

Speaker Gupta said that he had a word with the state Education Minister, Seema Trikha, adding that he sought the suspension of the school incharge, Bharti Gupta. He said, “I have also directed Education Department officials in the district to visit schools and check for low-quality material and other lapses at the premises and take the requisite steps.”

Importantly, the Panchkula MLA was joined by a few residents of the village and they claimed the students were being served very low-quality food items. Gupta and his team found bugs in 300 kg of rice, 60 kg of wheat flour, and 87 kg of expired milk at the premises. The toilets at the school were also found to be broken.

Students at the school apprised the speaker about the ‘watery’ dal being served to them. They said they had to drink hot water from the taps as the water cooler was not working. However, they said that the school did not allow them to switch it on, so they did not know if it was defunct or not.

Haryana Speaker Gian Chand Gupta visited the senior secondary school in Kot village and the Naggal village school too.