Special Focus on Quality of Fine Rice

Commissioner of Civil Supplies C.V.Anand has directed officials to pay special attention to the supply of fine rice for the Mid-Day-Meals Scheme without any compromise on its quality.

The Telangana Government is supplying almost 1.20 lakh metric tons of fine rice (BPT 5204, Sona Masuri) to government hostels and for implementation of Mid-Day-Meals Scheme.  Of late, many complaints had come on quality of fine rice and hence instructions were issued to all collectors and joint collectors.  With an idea of making distribution of fine rice to schools/hostels more transparent, accountable and responsible, detailed guidelines were issued.  Education Department was also requested to communicate the guidelines to all their field staff for proper implementation, Anand said.

Henceforth, school headmaster shall certify that the rice delivered, after cooking, is fine rice.  Once rice is off-loaded at the school premises (received by the HM), within 24 hours, the HM shall get the rice cooked and certify that it is fine rice(sanna biyyam).  If, after cooking, it is found that the rice is “doddu biyyam (though by look, it is fine rice) the concerned HM shall inform the Tahsildar and return the rice within 24 hours.  In such cases, action would be taken against the DT (CS) route officer and Tahsildar.

Once certified by HM that the cooked rice is of fine rice quality, if later, during inspection or based on any complaint it is found that the rice used for cooking is doddu biyyam, action shall be initiated against the concerned HM.  This shall be done every month, MEOs shall get the certificate of cooked rice from every HM and forward it to DEO. The DEO shall certify that only fine rice is cooked and given to children for the entire district.

These instructions are necessary to ensure that fine rice alone is made available to the schools under MDM scheme. All the collectors are requested to issue similar instructions in their districts. They may ensure that the above instructions are scrupulously followed in the schools and the HMs and MEOs be made responsible for proper check and submission of the certificate that the rice cooked and made available to the children under MDM Scheme is fine rice.