Overview
- The Karimnagar community kitchen was inaugurated on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, and will supply breakfast to 49,025 students in 669 government schools and 11 junior colleges across 17 mandals.
- Built at an estimated cost of ₹8 crore and run by the Hare Krishna Movement Charitable Foundation, the facility includes a quality-testing laboratory, roughly 100 staff and high‑capacity equipment that can produce about 15,000 idlis and 3,000 puris or dosas per hour.
- The Hyderabad‑based National Institute of Nutrition designed a weekly rotating menu for the kitchen and schools must send student counts a day ahead so meals can be prepared and dispatched for delivery by about 7:30 a.m.
- State officials say proposals are in place to scale the programme to roughly 23,106 schools covering about 17.72 lakh students, with one centralised kitchen planned in each of Telangana’s 31 districts at a projected cost around ₹240–245 crore and estimated direct and indirect employment of about 25,000 people.
- Government leaders point to the December 2024 Kodangal pilot, which they say raised attendance from about 75% to 90%, as the reason for scaling up and say wider roll‑out could improve punctuality and classroom concentration while creating local jobs and new logistical demands for school officials.