The response to the tenders floated by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation to supply chikkis to its schools is anything but encouraging. With the July 25 deadline fast approaching, the civic body is yet to find a supplier.
The civic body wants to supply an estimated 15 tonnes of chikki, sweets typically made from groundnuts and jaggery, every day to over four lakh students in 1,170 primary and 49 secondary schools across Mumbai.
However, the civic body is finding it difficult to zero in on any organisation that can supply the quantity of chikki in a bulk everyday.
Chairperson of the civic body's education committee Vinod Shelar admitted that the quantity was a problem, but was hopeful of receiving applications before July 25. "The applications should start coming in by next week. We have divided the schools in three zones: eastern, western and city," he said.
The BMC wants to provide each student with about 30 grams of chikki. The sweet is meant to replace flavoured milk that was initially being given to the students as it is high in nutrients as well as protein, calcium and iron.
Congress leader Devendra Amberkar said the civic body should think of a concrete plan to ensure that each and every municipal school kid is given nutritious food.
"If the BMC reaches out to different agencies for manufacturing chikkis, the quality might suffer. The civic body should keep in mind past incidents where municipal school children suffered because of poor quality and contaminated meals provided to them," Amberkar said.
Nitin Wadhwani of Citizens Association of Child Rights said the quality of the midday meals provided to the municipal school children is poor. "The chikkis were supposed to be provided as a substitute to flavoured milk. The quality of midday meals is not upto the mark and there has not been been much movement on the centralised kitchen issue despite the court order."
"The schools reopened a month ago and it is the students who are at the receiving end," he added.
Additional Municipal Commissioner Mohan Adtani was unavailable for comments.
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