Yogi Adityanath's government will set "Annapurna Bhojanalayas" across the Uttar Pradesh
Yogi Adityanath's Uttar Pradesh government has said it will soon open "
Annapurna Bhojanalayas" across the state to provide full meals at Rs 5 for the poor.
Chief Minister Adityanath's office announced the scheme on Twitter, saying it was aimed at ensuring that no one goes hungry in UP. The
Annapurna Bhojanalya will serve unlimited portions, it said.
Breakfast, which could include porridge, tea and
pakoras and
poha (beaten rice), will cost Rs 3 and lunch and dinner, with rice,
rotis,
dal and seasonal vegetables, will cost Rs 5 each. A basic plan has been drafted for now, said officials, and will be refined.
The Yogi Adityanath government, sources said, had begun work on the scheme days after it took over in March, but the formal launch will take a few more weeks.
It plans to set up 200 of such subsidised kitchens across the state and urban and semi-urban areas are being identified to ensure the poor benefit. The government hopes to serve a lot of migrant labour in cities like capital Lucknow, most of them from eastern UP and the Nepal Terai belt, who mostly live on the road and cook there too.
The UP government's labour department will set up the kitchens and will rope in NGOs to help run and maintain them.
Tamil Nadu's former chief minister J Jayalalithaa is credited with launching the first such mass subsidised canteens. But while hers were branded
Amma or mother, as she was called by lakhs of adoring fans and supporters, Yogi Adityanath's kitchens will not bear the Chief Minister's name. The BJP government in Rajasthan runs subsidised Annapurna Rasoi or kitchens for the poor.
In one of his first moves after he took oath in March this year, the 44-year-old UP Chief Minister renamed a number of schemes run by the previous Akhilesh Yadav government of the Samajwadi Party, removing the word "Samajwadi" and replacing it with the generic
Mukhyamantri or Chief Minister.
But he has allowed about 35,000 schoolbags emblazoned with images of his predecessor Akhilesh Yadav to be distributed in schools to ensure that public money is not wasted and the bags reach students in time for the new session.
The schoolbags were printed before Akhilesh Yadav lost power in the March election, won by the BJP with a landslide mandate.
The next batch will simply say "Mukhyamantri Yojana," officials said.