Meghalaya mid-day meal cooks threaten to quit if honorarium not hiked

SHILLONG,OCT 9: After two decades of cooking mid-day meals on honorarium,cook-cum-helpers under PM POSHAN in Meghalaya have decided to limit their workto once a week in protest. The callwas given by Gina Nengnong, president of the Union of Cook-cum-Helper PM POSHAN Meghalaya, at a meeting in Shillong on Friday. “Wehave served voluntarily for 20 years and accepted the token from theGovernment. From now onwards, we have to think of ourselves, we have to thinkof our future,” Nengnong said. “For20 years we have walked this service, we have worked for the society throughthe school children. We request the Prime Minister to look towards us,”she added. Statingthat cooks work like mothers, she said, “We treat school children like ourown children… Until now in our state, there has not been a single school thathas reported that children who ate the mid-day meal fell sick, and this isbecause we work from the heart, not thinking about the wage.”She saidthe voluntary tag does not match the work conditions. “Thework we do every day, going to work every day, it is no longer appropriate tocall it voluntary. If we are sick, do they allow us to be absent? Do they allowus to skip to go for other daily wage work? We have to go every day. If we sendsomeone else in our place, we have to pay from our own pocket,” she said. “Wewant you to change, to recognise us the cooks, to respect us if you think weare the foundation of this scheme,” Nengnong said. As thescheme pays only for 10 months, the Union said cooks will during October andNovember cook only once a week and help distribute rice so it does not rot, andspend the remaining days on other wage work. “Becausethe payment is honorarium, we too will go to work in that manner… We have nohesitation in taking this decision so that we can go for other work elsewhereto meet our needs,” she said. Nengnongsaid the Union is awaiting a response from the Union Cabinet and Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, with a final call to be taken in February. “Wewill wait for the Union Cabinet. While we await the decision of Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, in the second week of February we will have a General Meeting.If we do not get a reply to increase the honorarium, we will announce to end itcompletely,” she said.