Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, who is on a spree to scrap all the schemes initiated by previous Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, has now targetted "Anna Canteens", which provide subsidised food to people in cities and towns.
Following the orders of Jagan, the department of municipal administrations and urban development has given 'oral instructions' to close Anna Canteens from August 1.
This would mean that Anna Canteens will serve the last meal on July 31 night.
Anna Canteens were promised by Naidu during 2014 polls based on Tamil Nadu's "Amma Canteens" launched by late CM Jayalalithaa. However, Naidu launched them in 2018, just few months before 2019 Assembly polls.
There are 204 Anna canteens in all the 13 districts, divided into three zones. Buildings were built at a cost of Rs 35 lakh each and the cooking and supply of food was outsourced to Akshaya Patra.
The concept was to supply breakfast, lunch and dinner for Rs 5 for each meal and the government would contribute Rs 58 for all the three. The government owes over Rs 350 crore to Akshaya Patra. With no payments, Akshaya Patra, too wants to abandon this scheme.
About 1,000 to 1,200 people were served food for each session and at each canteen across the State, which add up to over 2 lakh meal for each of the sessions.
Soon after Jagan became CM on May 30, instructions were issued to Akshaya Patra in June to scale down the indent to 800 and further bring down the indent to 600 in July.
Now, instructions have been asked to completely stop serving food from August 1.