Anganwadis under the Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC) and the Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) have been unable to serve meals to nearly 36,000 children since the beginning of April due to a government delay in procuring edible cooking oil, officials confirmed on Wednesday.
The VMC, which oversees 399 anganwadis, stated that the situation is similar across the state because the department of Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) has encountered difficulties in procuring civil supplies, which are then distributed to agencies that cook and distribute meals to children.
After receiving complaints from parents that their children were not served meals for several days, VMC Opposition Leader Ami Ravat visited an anganwadi in Navayard on Wednesday.
Ravat, who also took along some food items for the children of the anganwadi, said, “When I inquired into the problem, I was told that the government has not yet dispatched cooking oil to be handed out to agencies, which is why they are unable to cook.”
Vadodara ICDS program coordinator, Sarla Amin, said that the issue has been taken up with the ICDS Department in Gandhinagar. “We receive the supplies every two or three months. We have received grains and other items as usual but the cooking oil, edible groundnut oil, has not reached us yet and thus we have been unable to hand it out to the agency”.
“We have informed the ICDS commissioner about the issue… The problem should be sorted in a couple of days. It is not true, however, that the children were left hungry. We managed to source their meals through donors,” she added.
According to VMC medical officer for health, Dr Devesh Patel, the procurement issue began on April 1, after the government directed the civic bodies to cease individual procurement, an arrangement that had been in place for six months until March 31.
“The civic bodies were allowed to locally source the supplies for a period of six months until March 31 due to Covid-19 curbs. Thereafter, as per the government directive, we have to revert to the original practice of collecting the supplies from the Food Corporation of India (FCI) and the supplies are procured by the state government,” said Patel.
In Surat, SMC standing committee chairman of Paresh Patel said oil and rice had been in “short supply for few days”, but assured that the supply will resume on Thursday from Gandhinagar.
“From tomorrow, the supply will be smooth. The Akshay Patra Foundation supplies food to anganwadis in Surat. We have also tied up with Sumul Dairy and from April 18, 26,000 children in 1093 aanganwadis in Surat will get fresh healthy food with milk,” he said.
The Gujarat State Civil Supplies Corporation Ltd (GSCSC) buys edible oil (refined cottonseed and groundnut oil) and provides it to the NGOs. The order is usually placed for procurement needed for six months.
Once the procured order reaches government godowns after quality testing, the NGOs collect it, for which ICDS generates the permit. GSCSC, which is a wholly-owned entity of the Gujarat government, carries out procurement, storage, and distribution of wheat, rice, pulses, and edible oil under the mid-day meal scheme
“70% of the six months’ supply of edible oil for Vadodara has already been provided. It was only a matter of coordination at the district level,” Shahid added.
In Surat, too, there was a problem with challan generation, which hampered the supply of edible oil. The Surat district collector met with NGOs and requested that they issue challans and lift the edible oil from GSCSC’s godowns.
KK Nirala, commissioner, Women and Child Development Department, did not respond to calls and text messages.