Overview
Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman (PM POSHAN) earlier known as the National Programme of Mid-Day Meal in Schools is one of the foremost rights based Centrally Sponsored Schemes under the National Food Security Act, 2013 (NFSA). The primary objective of the scheme is to improve the nutritional status of children studying in classes I-VIII in eligible schools. Nutrition and food norms under the scheme are as under:
| Nutrition norm per child per day | ||
|---|---|---|
| Level | Calorie | Portion |
| Primary | 450 | 12 gms |
| Upper Primary | 700 | 20 gms |
| Food norms per child per day | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Level | Food grains | Pulses | Vegetables | Oil & Fats | Salts & condiments |
| Primary | 100 gms | 20 gms | 50 gms | 5 gms | As per need |
| Upper Primary | 150 gms | 30 gms | 75 gms | 7.5 gms | As per need |
The main aspects of the PM POSHAN Scheme
- Food Grains: Supply of food grains @ 100 grams per child per school day for primary and 150 grams for upper primary at NFSA rate i.e. ₹ 1 per kg for coarse grains, ₹ 2 per kg for wheat and ₹ 3 per kg for rice.
- Cooking Cost: It includes cost of ingredients, e.g. pulses, vegetables, cooking oil, other condiments and fuel. The per child per day cooking cost is ₹ 4.97 for primary and ₹ 7.45 for upper primary w.e.f. 1st April, 2020.
- Honorarium to Cook-cum-Helpers: @ ₹ 1000 per month for 10 months in a year.
- Transportation Assistance: As per PDS rate for transportation of food grains from FCI godown to school door steps. Maximum₹ 1500 per MT for transportation of food grains from FCI godown to school door steps for States other than NER and 2 Himalayan States and 2 UTs.
- Management, Monitoring and Evaluation (MME): @ 3% of aggregate of cost of foodgrains, cooking cost, Honorarium to Cook-cum-Helpers and Transportation Assistance.
- Provision of Meals during summer vacations in drought/ disaster affected areas.
- Kitchen-cum-store: As per plinth area norm and State Schedule of Rates. 20 sq meter for schools having enrolment of 100 students. Additional 4 sq meter for every addition of up to 100 students.
- Kitchen devices: Linked with enrolment.
- Repair of kitchen-cum-stores: ₹ 10,000/- per unit, for the kitchen-cum-stores, which were constructed 10 years ago.
- Fortification of food items: Fortification of food items in a systematic manner through Food Corporation of India (FCI).
- Innovation / Flexibility component with no separate budgetary support: Five percent of the aggregate of the cost of foodgrains, cooking cost, transport assistance, honorarium to cook-cum-helpers, and MME with no separate additional budgetary support for this component. The requirement of funds under this component will be met from available funds and implemented as per Department of Expenditure’s OM No. 55(5)/PF-II/2011 dated 06.09.2016.
- Provision of meal to preparatory classes or Balvatika (that is before class I) in primary schools as covered in Samagra Shiksha as envisaged underNational Education Policy.
The objectives of the Scheme are to address two of the pressing problems for majority of children in India, viz. hunger and education by:
- Improving the nutritional status of eligible children in Government and Government aided schools.
- Encouraging poor children, belonging to disadvantaged sections, to attend school more regularly and help them concentrate on classroom activities.
- Providing nutritional support to children of elementary stage in drought-affected and disaster affected areas during summer vacation.
For more details, click here: https://pmposhan.education.gov.in
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