Tamil Nadu Government Orders The Closure Of Noon-Meal Centres With Lesser Than 25 Students Across The State 

The Tamil Nadu government has issued a mandate to close noon-meal centres with less than 25 students across the state. The meal programme was introduced in 1962 by former Chief Minister K Kamaraj with the aim of bringing more children to government schools by providing a free and nourishing meal and has more than 50 lakh beneficiaries at 43,200 centres in Tamil Nadu, according to official data, reports TOI.

Employees working at the meal centres believe that the state government’s latest directive will lead to the closure of over 8,000 centres with 25 students or fewer. This will not only lead to large-scale job cuts and an adverse impact on enrollment figures of public schools in the state, claimed the employees. The state government, on the other hand, responded by saying that the closure has to be done to shuffle the workforce and food from centres in schools with low enrollment to centres with a higher number of beneficiaries.

Each centre employs an organiser along with a head cook and assistant with the number of employees according to the strength of the beneficiaries. The employees are paid a monthly allowance between Rs 5,000- Rs 7,000 out of which the Union government pays Rs 1,000 while the State government bears the remaining cost.

R Noorajahan, Secretary, Tamil Nadu Noon Meal Workers Association, said that the state’s order will lead to a delay in the distribution of food to the centres across the state while adding that as many as 10,000 posts of cooking assistants remain vacant and the closure of centres would add to that growing list and also harm the beneficiaries.