West Bengal removes eggs from school meals after ISKCON contract
The BJP-run state’s decision affects a lunch programme serving nearly 12 million pupils and has drawn criticism over nutrition and food choice.
By Sofia Marchetti · World Affairs Correspondent
3 min read
West Bengal has taken eggs off the menu in government school lunches after awarding the statewide meal contract to the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, Al Jazeera reported. The change matters because nearly 12 million pupils in the eastern Indian state rely on the meals, and critics say the decision mixes nutrition policy with food politics.
According to Al Jazeera, the new Bharatiya Janata Party government announced last week that ISKCON, also known as the Hare Krishna movement, would run the midday meal programme across government schools. ISKCON serves a strictly vegetarian menu and treats eggs in the same category as meat, Al Jazeera reported.
ISKCON has said it will provide nutritious food despite removing eggs. Al Jazeera reported that an ISKCON spokesperson told reporters that soya or cottage cheese of the same weight could contain more protein than eggs; the spokesperson was later sent on enforced leave for speaking to the media.
A large school food programme
India’s midday meal programme began in Tamil Nadu in the 1960s and became national policy in 1995, according to Al Jazeera. Researchers have credited the programme with helping raise school participation, though the country still has high dropout rates, especially among girls entering their teenage years.
About 120 million children across India eat the meals each school day, making it the world’s largest programme of its kind, Al Jazeera reported. In 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government renamed it PM Poshan, though it remains widely known as the midday meal scheme.
Al Jazeera reported that nutritionists and education specialists have traditionally favoured hot meals prepared near schools, using local ingredients and community oversight. In recent years, some states have allowed private trusts and nonprofits to serve meals in selected schools, and ISKCON’s nonprofit Akshaya Patra already supplies lunches in parts of more than 10 states.
Before West Bengal’s decision, no major state had given ISKCON control of the entire midday meal operation, according to Al Jazeera.
Eggs and the nutrition dispute
Roughly half of India’s states and federally governed territories serve eggs in school meals, Al Jazeera reported. The list includes Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha, Assam, Bihar, Tripura, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Meghalaya, along with Puducherry and Jammu and Kashmir.
West Bengal had served eggs once a week before the change, while Tamil Nadu serves them every school day, according to Al Jazeera. The meals also commonly include rice, roti, lentils and vegetables, and children who do not eat eggs can opt out.
Nutritionists cited by Al Jazeera said eggs are difficult to replace because they contain all nine essential amino acids and are easy to standardise in school meals. They said alternatives such as lentils, soya and cottage cheese can vary in quality, quantity and dilution when served as curries.
Sandeep Shastri, a political scientist and national coordinator of the Lokniti research network, told Al Jazeera that parents should decide whether children receive animal-based or plant-based protein, regardless of the supplier.
Political backlash
The decision follows the BJP’s first state election victory in West Bengal in May, Al Jazeera reported. Opposition leaders from the All India Trinamool Congress, which lost power to the BJP, have accused the government of imposing vegetarian preferences.
TMC leader Derek O’Brien wrote on X that the new BJP government was depriving children of nutrition by removing eggs from midday meals and “imposing vegetarianism,” according to Al Jazeera. The report noted that TMC members of Parliament have been pelted with eggs by protesters in West Bengal in recent months.
Al Jazeera also reported that Maharashtra, another BJP-ruled state, stopped funding eggs in midday meals in 2025, though schools may still raise their own funds. Official National Family Health Survey data cited by Al Jazeera says about 70 percent of Indians eat meat, fish and eggs at least occasionally.
This story draws on original reporting from Al Jazeera.