Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to India, Milinda Moragoda recently visited the Headquarters of the Akshaya Patra Foundation in Bengaluru, Karnataka to study their renowned mid-day meal programme for school children.

Established in 2000 as a non-profit trust of International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), Akshaya Patra is one of the world’s largest not-for-profit run school feeding programmes, serving wholesome food every school day to over 2.3 million children from 22,367 schools across 15 states and 2 union territories of India.

At present, the Foundation operates 67 large-scale kitchens in these states and union territories, which has been made possible by successful Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) with the Government of India, various state governments and generous supporters.

The organisation is the largest implementing partner of the Indian Government’s Mid-Day Meal Scheme or the Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman (PM-POSHAN) designed to better the nutritional standing of school-age children nationwide.

The Foundation is continuously leveraging technology to multiply its reach and their state-of-the-art kitchens have become a subject of study and attracted visitors from around the world.

During his visit to the Akshaya Patra Foundation’s Headquarters in Bengaluru, High Commissioner Moragoda met with the President of ISKCON Bengaluru & Foundation’s Chairman Sri Madhu Pandit Dasa and Sri Chanchalapathi Dasa, Vice Chairman of the Foundation. Their discussions centred around the possibilities of replicating a similar mid-day meal programme in Sri Lanka.