The Mid Day Meal is the world’s largest school feeding programme reaching out to about 12 crore children in over 12.65 lakh schools/EGS centres across the country.

Mid-Day Meal in schools has had a long history in India. In 1925, a Mid-Day Meal Programme was introduced for disadvantaged children in Madras Municipal Corporation. By the mid 1980s three States viz. Gujarat, Kerala and Tamil Nadu and the UT of Pondicherry had universalized a cooked Mid-Day Meal Programme with their own resources for children studying at the primary stage By 1990-91 the number of States implementing the mid day meal programme with their own resources on a universal or a large scale had increased to twelve states.

8.41 cr Primary children and 3.36 cr Upper Primary children i.e a total of 11.77 cr children were estimated to be benefited from MDM Scheme during 2009-10. 11.04 Crore children were covered under MDM Scheme during 2009-10.

During 2010-11 11.36 Cr children i.e 7.97 Cr. children in primary and 3.39 Cr. children in upper primary are expected to be covered in 12.63 lakhs institutions.

Today, Mid-day Meal scheme is serving primary and upper primary school children in entire country.

For more details see: http://mdm.nic.in/