The meeting of primary school teachers with education department officials at Vikas Bhavan in Patna on Monday. Picture by Jai Prakash

The largest union of primary schoolteachers in the state has decided to call off its boycott of the midday meal service and rejoin the welfare scheme from Tuesday.

The Bihar Rajya Prathamik Shikshak Sangh had been boycotting the midday meal scheme since July 25, demanding that the government appoints an agency to manage the programme, as involving teachers to implement it interfered with their academic duties.

On Monday, the members of the union met officials of the education department.

Midday meal director R. Laxmanan, primary education director A.K. Chaudhary and others discussed the issue with the Bihar Rajya Prathamik Shikshak Sangh president, Brajnandan Sharma. After the meeting, Chaudhary said: “The teachers have decided to call off their boycott for the time being. They will help in serving midday meal to students from tomorrow (Tuesday).”

In Bihar, around 70,000 students benefit from this scheme — the largest such welfare programme in the world. Since last Thursday, midday meal has not been served to thousands of students.

In the meeting on Monday, it was decided that over the next six months, the education department will develop a mechanism under which persons from other agencies will be hired for non-academic work in schools, such as supervising midday meal and construction.

Earlier, teachers were roped in to perform these duties as well.

The change will proceed from the district-level to the blocks and then to the villages. First, the teachers at the district-level will be removed from non-academic duties, then in the blocks and villages.

The president of the union, Brajnandan Sharma, said: “If the government thinks seriously about the issue and takes positive steps to keep teachers away from non-academic work, it will improve the quality of education in schools.”

The education department officials and the union members would meet again in October to assess the progress on the assurances they had been given.

Sources in the education department said it is planning to seek the help of more non-government organisations to supply better free lunches.

At present, five NGOs are engaged in supplying midday meal to government schools in Patna, Gaya and Muzaffarpur districts.

The department is also planning to get help from NGO Akshaya Patra for distribution of freshly cooked meals to students.

On a trial basis, the organisation, which provides meals to students studying in government schools in nine states across India, will start services in Patna and Muzaffarpur districts. The organisation will set up centralised kitchens in two places at a cost of Rs 14 crore. Around a lakh students will benefit from it.