Children studying in classes 1 to 10 and those in anganwadis will be served milk on five days a week under the Ksheera Bhagya scheme from next year. At present, they are being provided milk three days a week.
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah announced this on Tuesday after distributing benefits under various welfare schemes at Varuna, his home constituency in Mysuru district.
He said at present 8 lakh litres of milk was being served under the programme on each of the three days — Monday, Tuesday and Friday. He felt that nutrition was key to improve the learning level among schoolchildren. The government was spending Rs. 4,800 crore annually on the Ksheera Bhagya scheme.
Enhanced subsidy
He said milk production in the State had gone up from 35 lakh litres to 63 lakh litres a day after the government increased the subsidy to milk producers from Rs. 2 to Rs. 4 a litre. “The production is expected to touch 70 lakh litres [a day] shortly,” he said.
Anna Bhagya Mr. Siddaramaiah asked deputy commissioners and officials of the Department of Food and Civil Supplies to make it mandatory for fair price shops to display the names of all beneficiaries at the shops and book criminal cases against the shopkeepers if they failed to comply with the new rule.
Mr. Siddaramaiah said the government was spending Rs. 4,500 crore a year to run the Anna Bhagya programme and at least 1.03 crore BPL families were being benefited.
He said the market price of rice being distributed under the programme was around Rs. 25 a kg. Therefore, steps must be taken to check bogus ration cards and prevent hoarding and black marketing of rice, he said.
The Chief Minister also directed officials to terminate the licences of fair price shops if illegalities were noticed in the implementation of the programme.
