Mancherial teachers, students grow vegetables in school

The headmistress said they were able to produce around 2 kilograms of organic vegetables every day.

Mancherial: In a tale of achieving self-sufficiency and providing healthy food, teachers and students of a primary school jointly are growing various vegetable crops in a kitchen garden on the premises of the school at Peddapet village in Dandepalli mandal and that too without applying harmful pesticides and fertilizers. Significantly, the vegetables are used for mid-day meals at the school.

“The school’s infrastructure was developed under the Mana Ooru-Mana Badi scheme recently. With the advent of a compound wall, bore well, over head tanks, etc, created through the initiative, we started raising tomato, green chilli, beans, brinjal, ridged gourd, leafy vegetables on an open space in a corner of the institution this year,” B Srilatha, headmistress and driving force of the novel initiative told ‘Telangana Today.’

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The headmistress said they were able to produce around 2 kilograms of organic vegetables every day. The mid day meal and breakfasts under the Chief Minister’s Breakfast scheme is being prepared using these vegetables, providing healthy food to 52 students of the school. Students are involved in growing vegetables by spending 30 minutes before and after the school every day.

The school underwent a transformation with the help of the Mana Ooru-Mana Badi scheme. Infrastructure of the school was improved, at an estimated cost of Rs 22.80 lakh, helping the teachers and students to grow the vegetables in the kitchen garden a few months back. “Our school is now nothing short of a corporate institution on many fronts after being renovated under the scheme,” Srilatha shared.

Meanwhile, the strength of the school increased from 22 in 2018 to 52 in 2023. The credit goes to sustained efforts of the headmistress, who was posted here in 2018. Srilatha claimed that she spent Rs 2 lakh from her savings to create certain infrastructure of the institution such as parking tiles, modern toilets, etc., for the convenience of the pupils.