Akshaya Patra completes one
year in Jaipur
The Akshaya Patra facility in Rajasthan
completed one year of its operations in December 2005. This
function was graced by the Honourable Chief Minister of
Rajasthan, Smt. Vasundara Raje, Honourable Minister of Education,
Shri Ghanshyam Tiwari, and others. Mr. Mohandas Pai, Trustee
of The Akshaya Patra Foundation and Chief Financial Officer
& Board Member Infosys Technologies Ltd., Bangalore
was also present during the occasion. Akshaya Patra currently
provides 3,05,340 hygienic and nutritious meals to underprivileged
children everyday in India.
Speaking on the occasion, the Vice Chairmain
of the Akshaya Patra Foundation, Shri Chanchalapathi Dasa
was happy to announce that as of December 2005 they were providing
midday meals every day to 51,168 children in 287 schools of
Jaipur. He said that on the request of the Chief Minister
they had demonstrated a model of the mid-day meal program
for rural areas.Presently the Foundation is serving 8310 children
in 56 villages of Baran district. About 240 women are employed
under this program.
Mechanized Kitchen
The Chief Minister inaugurated the mechanized
kitchen. The kitchen has three mechanized roti making machines
and each of these can make 2000 rotis per hour. It has two
industrial steam boilers, each of which can produce 600 kg
of steam per hour. The steam produced will be fed to three
Dhal Cookers of 2000 litres capacity, each of which can prepare
dhal for 5000 children in 2 hours. The steam will then be
fed to four Rice Cookers of 80 kg capacity, each of which
can cook rice for 800 students in 20 minutes.
These Rice and Dhal Cookers were custom made
according to Akshaya Patra's specifications. In addition there
is a vegetable cutting machine (700 kg per hour), atta kneading
machine and diesel generators as part of the kitchen infrastructure.
There are ten custom built vehicles to transport food to the
schools from the kitchen facility here. The Foundation has
invested Rs.76 lakhs to set up this kitchen facility and an
additional Rs.55 lakhs for the vehicles to transport the food.
This perhaps is the biggest kitchen facility in Rajasthan
dedicated entirely to the service of underprivileged children.
Vidya Akshaya Patra
In partnership with Johari Dalam Sohanlal Charitable
Baid Trust, Mumbai, scholarships were distributed to deserving
students of class 11 by the Chief Minister and the Education
Minister. One hundred students from 16 Government schools
received Rs.2000 each in order to encourage them to continue
with further studies. The scholarships were sponsored by Shri
Chandanmal Baid, Chairman of the Mumbai-based trust.
For more details log on to: www.akshayapatra.org
Click here to donate : www.akshayapatra.org/make_a_donation.html
Contact Person : R. Govinda Dasa
Address: The Akshaya Patra Foundation
ESTI Hostel Building, Behind OTS, Jhalana Institute Area,
Jhalana Doongri, Jaipur 302 004. Rajasthan.
Phone : 0141-2707947
Author: Manjunath N
Picture Courtesy: Akshaya Patra Foundation, Jaipur
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