Charbhita Primary School, located in poverty-stricken Haripur, has doubled the number of its students since launching a midday lunch program.
We applaud such an initiative taken by the school’s principal, Imran Ali, and the four teachers, and admire their dedication to the cause, providing much-needed education and nutrition in return for no salary.
Before the program, parents would opt for sending their kids to work instead of to school. This is a scenario that has become all too common in our country.
Nutrition is crucial to a child’s well-being, and it has not only allowed them to continue to stay in school, but has also improved their ability to concentrate on their studies and not worry about where to get their next meal. As a result, the government should work towards ensuring that such a model is implemented everywhere across the nation.
Do we want our kids to be healthy? Yes. Do we want them to be educated? Absolutely.
India’s Midday Meal Program, which is the largest of its kind in the world, has already shown great success, providing meals to over 120 million children. In Bangladesh, the centralised model, which would take advantage of public-private partnerships, would not only ensure healthy and hygienic meals for our children, but also create room for employment.
We hope that Charbhita shows us the way forward but such an initiative is difficult to sustain when reliant on lone individuals. The government should take steps to create opportunities for other schools so that they too can adopt the model. A nutritious meal is every children’s right.