Andhra Pradesh - Anantapur   

Rs. 2.68 cr. for clearing mid-day meal bills

ANANTAPUR: The State Government has released Rs. 2.68 crore to the district for clearing the pending bills of agencies providing mid-day meals in schools. The disbursement of bills will be completed in three days.

The release of funds follows an ultimatum issued by the cooking agencies that they were not in a position to provide mid-day meals in schools from December 10 due to huge pending bills.

Accordingly, District Collector N. Sridhar spoke to the education department officials and got the funds released to resolve the problem.

The AITUC-affiliated AP Mid Day Meal Scheme Workers’ Union leaders S.M.C. Basha and Laxmidevi explained that bills for providing mid-day meals were not paid to the agencies for the last seven months in Garladinne mandal and for the last five months in Beluguppa mandal, as an example.

Bills were not cleared in several mandals from March this year and the bills payment was completely stopped for the last three months.

They requested the government to pay the bills every month as they have been borrowing money from moneylenders to arrange mid-day meals. They also demanded hike in the menu charges.

Meanwhile, the Collector told the mid-day meal agencies not to worry about the pending bills as they would be cleared by Tuesday.

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