Amid the flurry of goodies — from land to tube well repair kits to tricycles — distributed by Union minister Jairam Ramesh, chief minister Arjun Munda and his deputies, what starving villagers relished most were steamed rice, mashed vegetables and eggs, courtesy the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) mobile kitchen.
The CRPF’s 197th Battalion, engaged in weeding out Maoists, today launched its operation food, thanks to what they claimed was the first paramilitary mobile kitchen unit in India.
The initiative is aimed at distributing food among villagers everyday as a part of a civic action programme to earn the trust of people in rebel areas.
The vehicle-mounted, fully mechanised kitchen, occupying a compact 7x7sqft area, has three gas stoves and exhaust fans as well as a wash basin and a 500-litre capacity water tanker. In three hours, officers claimed that five jawans — three trained in cooking and two in preliminary preparations such as chopping vegetables and grinding spices — could rustle up meals for more than 500 hungry mouths.
“This mobile kitchen unit costs around Rs 30 lakh and has been launched specially as part of the Saranda development plan,” commandant of 197th Battalion Lal Chand Yadav told The Telegraph.
He added that every day, the van would reach one village and offer its people a hot meal. “There are 56 villages in the six panchayats — Loilar, Makranda, Chiria, Gangda, Chotanagra and Digha — with an extremely poor population of around 36,000,” the commandant said.
The staple diet of villagers in the rebel-hit forest is pokal bhaat, which comprises rice mixed with water to which a pinch of salt has been added. Onion and green chillies are a rare luxury for most.
Compared to that, today’s lunch comprising vegetables and eggs was akin to cordon bleu fare. And yes, it met the approval of the Union minister and the chief minister, who inspected the kitchen and tasted the spread.
Then, the lunch was distributed amongst 800 villagers at Chotanagra.
“We’re hoping that this civic action plan, launched as a pilot project in Saranda, is accepted well by the villagers. If successful, it can be replicated in other rebel-hit areas within the state and outside,” the officer added.