Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has instructed district education officers to abide by new guidelines and provide fruits as a nutritional substitute to vegetarian students in midday meal (MDM) under the PM-POSHAN scheme.
This followed complaints being made by parents and school management committees against certain schools failing to provide fruits to students who are unwilling to eat eggs.
To make the scheme more inclusive, the department in August announced to provide fruits like bananas and apples or any seasonal fruit to vegetarian students from Sishu Vatika (pre-primary class) to class X on days when eggs are served under the MDM scheme, including Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Accordingly, district education officers were instructed to arrange fruits at a cost equivalent to one egg for these students.