Hyderabad, October 6: The Telangana government has launched the Chief Minister’s Breakfast Scheme, aiming to provide nutritious meals to students attending government schools. State ministers marked the inauguration of the scheme by sharing breakfast with students at various schools in different districts.
The program, designed to offer quality education along with nutritious food, will be implemented across the state later this month when schools reopen after the Dasara holidays. Approximately 23 lakh students in 67,147 government schools statewide will benefit from this initiative.
K.T. Rama Rao, the state minister for municipal administration and urban development, officially launched the scheme at a school in West Marredpally, Secunderabad. Breakfast will be served to all students from Class 1 to 10, 45 minutes before the start of classes.
The breakfast menu includes items such as idli sambar, wheat rava, upma chutney, puri, aaloo khorma, tomato bhath, khichdi, and pongal.
Minister for Education Sabitha Indra Reddy inaugurated the scheme at a school in Ravirala, Rangareddy district, while Home Minister Mahmood Ali launched the CM Breakfast Scheme in the Uppal area of Hyderabad.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao had announced the scheme last month as a Dasara gift. It is estimated to cost an additional Rs 400 crore to the state exchequer annually. The government’s goal is to not only provide nutritious meals to students from economically disadvantaged families but also to improve their focus on studies.
The scheme was initiated to address the difficulties faced by parents, especially those working as farm laborers, who leave for work early in the morning.
A team of IAS officers was sent by KCR to examine the implementation of a similar scheme in Tamil Nadu. After studying the breakfast scheme for students in Tamil Nadu, the officers submitted a report recommending its expansion to cover high school students as well.
KTR (K.T. Rama Rao) mentioned that the implementation of the scheme has been entrusted to Manna Trust, which operates a centralized kitchen in Uppal, Hyderabad, with the capacity to prepare two lakh meals. He emphasized the importance of ensuring the quality of food and conducting regular quality checks through random sampling.
