New Delhi: To bring efficiency in midday
meal programme in schools, the government is working on a SMS
model to get regular feedbacks from school principals and
other stakeholders about its implementation.
The SMS-based technology solution is being used in Uttar
Pradesh to get schemes across the state's 150,000 schools.
"The aim is to cover the country with this SMS-based
model by June and work in this regard is in progress," joint
secretary in the HRD Ministry Amarjit Singh told reporters
here.
Arguably the largest school feeding programme, the
programme reaches out to over 10.46 crore children in primary
and upper primary schools in 11.92 lakh schools.
As principals will be sent SMS and will be asked to reply
with their inputs. The community at large including sarpanchs
and parents could also be involved. This will help in
monitoring food being served and checking availability of
stock, he said.
As part its efforts to strengthen monitoring mechanism,
HRD Ministry launched a website providing detailed guidelines
about the scheme, approvals for various states and physical
and financial progress under the scheme.
Launched by HRD Minister Kapil Sibal, the site
www.mdm.nic.in provides detail about the monitoring mechanism
as well as reports of review missions and quarterly review
reports.
It also provides details of key officials responsible for
the scheme.
PTI
First Published: Monday, January 30, 2012, 20:59