Hemant Soren urged to provide eggs in midday meals five days a week -Achintya Ganguly

-The Telegraph

According to national family health survey, 67.5 per cent of children in state below the age of 5 years are anaemic while 39.4 per cent are underweight

Ranchi: About 200 concerned citizens wrote an open letter to Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren on Saturday, urging him to provide eggs in midday meals for schoolchildren five days a week.

“We are dismayed to note that the Jharkhand government’s long-standing promise to include eggs five days a week in children’s midday meals is yet to be fulfilled,” said the letter, signed by 196 persons, including economist Jean Dreze and many others representing various civil society organisations.

“We are writing as concerned citizens and friends of Jharkhand to urge you to redeem this promise without delay,” they added. 

The students of primary and upper primary schools in the state were earlier provided with eggs three times every week, the letter pointed out, adding the practice was “arbitrarily reduced to twice a week by the then BJP government in January 2019”.

“Soon after it came to power, your government promised to raise it to five days a week, the letter reminded Hemant, adding “unfortunately, nothing of the sort has happened so far”.

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