The Karnataka government has decided to replace bananas with groundnut-jaggery chikki for schoolkids who do not eat eggs.
Also, the department of public instruction is non-committal to the growing demand for dropping eggs from the midday meal menu. It has decided to provide chikki in place of bananas, to match the nutritional content of eggs.
The department has already held talks with the Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) and is working out modalities for the preparation and supply of chikki.
Officials said, before reaching the students, the chikki will undergo various tests to ensure nutrition levels.
“We have asked KMF to prepare a sample, which will be sent to the Central Food Technology Research Institute (CFTRI) in Mysuru to test the nutrition levels. Once it is approved, we will place orders for production,” said a senior official of the department.
Following objections and suggestions from nutritionists that bananas are no match to boiled eggs, the department has taken a decision to replace them with chikki.
“We have even consulted some nutritionists and they said jaggery and slightly crushed groundnut are good sources of protein and iron,” the official said.
However, one of the challenges before the department in providing chikki is to avoid plastic packaging.
B C Nagesh, the primary and secondary education minister, told DH, “We do not want to wrap chikki in plastic, but it is also difficult to wrap it in paper as the chikki may absorb moisture and melt. Barring this, we do not have any other problem in distributing chikki.”
“As of now, both bananas and chikki will be offered to the students. It is left to them to consume what they want. Later, based on the demand, we will decide which one to retain,” Nagesh said.
The overall idea behind providing boiled eggs to children in government and aided schools of seven Kalyana Karnataka districts was to address the issue of malnutrition among kids.
Eggs and bananas were introduced in the mid-day meals scheme by the union government.
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