Supreme Court asks Centre to frame model scheme for community kitchens

The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Centre to frame a model scheme for opening community kitchens across the states, wondering if it was believable that no death was reported due to starvation.

The top court also asked why political parties, which announced freebies during elections, did nothing against the malnutrition.

A bench presided over by Chief Justice N V Ramana said the states should file a reply in two weeks on malnutrition and starvation deaths.

The court took into consideration a submission by Attorney General K K Venugopal who said that no starvation death has been reported by the states.

"States have reported no deaths due to starvation, is it believable," the bench asked him.

“Can we afford to take that there is no starvation death in the country," the court asked further, emphasising the need to end hunger.

Hearing a plea by Arun Dhawan and others related to subsidised canteens across the states and union territories, the bench, comprising Justices A S Bopanna and Hima Kohli told Venugopal that the Union government should give the latest data on starvation deaths.

The bench said that central government should frame a model scheme for community kitchens and leave it on state governments to implement it.

The court clarified that it didn't mean that a universal scheme should be framed, as there was no straitjacket formula to address the issue, but at least government can frame a model scheme. The Centre can explore possibility of providing additional food grains to the state governments and they can take care of logistics, it added.

The court also said States may have to tweak the model scheme to suit local food habits. It also referred to Indira canteen scheme launched by the Karnataka government.

Venugopal, for his part, said that not a single state government has reported starvation death, but pointed at news report claiming that a starvation death was reported in Tamil Nadu since the doctors did not find food in the body of the 5-year-old child in the post mortem.

He cited scarcity of funds for the operationality of community kitchens scheme across the country, to address hunger and malnutrition, saying the Centre was already funding 131 welfare schemes.

The petitioners counsel Ashima Mandla asked the court to set up an expert committee in the matter to formulate scheme for community kitchens across the country.

The court fixed the matter for further hearing after three weeks.

Watch the latest DH videos: