As many as 48 students of the recently inaugurated Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Backward Classes Welfare Gurukul School for girls at Velugumatla near Khammam were taken ill due to suspected food poisoning.
Sources said that a section of the students of the residential school complained of severe stomach ache, diarrhoea and nausea after consuming food served at the mess in the residential institution on Monday night.
The ailing students were admitted to the District Headquarters Hospital by the school staff on Tuesday morning. Some of them groaned in pain unable to bear severe stomach cramps even as the doctors promptly attended to them by administering saline and providing treatment. The condition of the ailing students is stable and all of them are recovering fast, hospital sources said.
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Meanwhile, SFI activists staged a protest in front of the BC Gurukul school at Velugumatla in the afternoon demanding stern action against those responsible.
for the alleged food poisoning incident.
The demonstrators pointed out that 200 students of classes V to VII were staying in the congested rented building housing the Gurukul school.
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They alleged that the unhygienic conditions, supply of stale food and lack of proper supervision of the mess at the residential school had led to the incident.
‘Poor conditions’
The incident was a clear pointer to the “sorry state of affairs” prevailing in a majority of the newly-opened residential schools in both Khammam and Bhadradri-Kothagudem districts, the protestors said.
When contacted, District Coordinator of the BC residential schools Anjali told The Hindu that only a few students of the total 200 students of the Velugumatla-based BC residential school had taken ill on Monday night.
Efforts are on to ascertain the cause of their sudden illness, she said.