Video: In Chhattisgarh School, Mid-Day Meal Is Just Rice And Turmeric

Over 52,000 anganwadi centres in the state have also not been supplied ready-to-eat food. Women and Child Development Minister Lakshmi Rajwade, however, maintains that the distribution of nutritious food is ongoing.

Refusing to be outdone by reports of children being served chapatis and salt in their mid-day meals in other states, a school in Chhattisgarh has been giving its students plain rice with only some turmeric added to it. Vegetables are missing, as are pulses on several occasions, which would have enabled the young children to at least have some khichdi.

The state's education department has a prescribed menu for mid-day meals, promising a variety of nutritious food. The reality at the school and some other institutions reveals, however, that the menu remains only on paper.

The malnutrition rate in Chhattisgarh stood at 17.76% in 2022.