In a shocker, a litre of milk was mixed in a bucket of water and served to 81 students in UP school

There’s no dearth of issues in this country at any given time — the state of the economy, joblessness and above all a political slugfest among our very leaders who are expected to tackle them. Yet one must spare a thought for those children, who were served adulterated milk in Uttar Pradesh’s Sonbhadra district. A litre of milk was mixed in a bucket of boiling water before the concoction was served to 81 students in a Government primary school. This scandal,  coming close on the heels of the roti-rice-salt scam in September, shows how the mid-day meal scheme in schools is being undermined and subjected to the cruellest form of greed. The Uttar Pradesh (UP) Government has indeed failed to stem the rot in a system that works under the guise of serving the poor even as budgets under the scheme grow bigger and fund pilferage burns the biggest hole every passing day.

UP ought to be ashamed. According to the Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, the highest number of complaints related to mid-day meals across the country — 14 of the 52 cases reported — came from the State. Yet, caught off guard, the Government’s immediate reaction was   to shoot the messenger. It disowned the widely circulated video, which clearly showed a packet of one-litre milk being mixed into the water, claiming  there was no shortage of milk in the first place and that milk was served later. A tad better than the roti-salt scam in Mirzapur when the State administration penalised the investigating journalist instead. Thankfully, the gram panchayat member who shot the video has not been charged with sedition. The administration has also filed an FIR against a contractual teacher and suspended another for not informing it about the milk shortage in the school. Is it then just a coincidence that in September, the Government had sought suggestions on alternatives to milk because of a shortage of supply? It means milk was either not available in sufficient quantities or suffered quality issues back then. The well-intentioned mid-day meal scheme is faltering in execution because of a lack of coherent nutrition policies and the absence of accountability and coordination between various stakeholders like the Centre, States and district schools. The kids simply suffer.