After tribal students’ stir, state sets up panel to review food supply to ashram schools

The move comes amid mounting complaints about tribal residential and ashram schools pertaining to inadequate infrastructure, poor academic performance, lack of basic amenities, student safety concerns and the quality of food served to students

MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government has constituted a nine-member committee to review the functioning of centralised kitchens supplying meals to tribal students in government-run ashram schools, following protests over the quality and timely delivery of food.

Mumbai, India. Oct 10, 2026 - Tribal students who marched from Nashik to Mumbai demanding basic facilities in their schools and hostels were detained by police at Tilak Bhavan, the Congress’s Maharashtra headquarters, and taken out of the city. The action came after the students insisted on meeting Governor Jishnu Dev Verma and were denied permission to hold a protest at Azad Maidan. Mumbai, India. Oct 10, 2026. (Photo by Raju Shinde/HT Photo) (Raju Shinde)

The move comes amid mounting complaints about tribal residential and ashram schools pertaining to inadequate infrastructure, poor academic performance, lack of basic amenities, student safety concerns and the quality of food served to students. It is also the fifth major decision taken by the tribal development department in a little over a month following protests by tribal students in Pune, Nashik and Mumbai.

Since August 14, tribal students have staged a series of protests across the state. They held two indefinite hunger strikes during this period, with the latest agitation taking the form of a long march from Nashik to Mumbai. One group of students was forcibly stopped by the police at Navi Mumbai while the others who had reached the city were detained and transported back by the police. All these agitations had continued even after representatives of the tribal students met chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on August 29 and he accepted all their demands.

“The panel will conduct physical inspections of centralised kitchens as well as government ashram schools. It will meet kitchen operators, school management committees and student representatives to understand the problems on the ground before submitting its findings,” the GR states.

The committee will be headed by Gopichand Kadam, additional commissioner, Thane. Its members include Dinkar Pawara, additional commissioner of Nashik; Pradip More, undersecretary; Santosh Thube, joint commissioner; Ganesh Idivarte, project officer; Ujwal Pahurkar, United Nations Development Programme state coordinator; a representative of Stree Shakti and a UNICEF nutrition expert. Chandrakant Pawar, project officer, Nandurbar, has been appointed member secretary.

The committee has been given until October 30 to submit its report to the commissioner, tribal development. The commissioner will then forward the report, with his comments and recommendations, to the state government by November 6.

The committee is the latest in a series of measures announced by the state government following the tribal students’ protests. On September 4, it empowered the tribal development department to initiate the derecognition of residential schools that failed to meet prescribed standards. On August 25, it announced the withdrawal of its decision to impose a 30-year age limit on tribal students seeking admission to government-run hostels.

On August 29, the tribal development department ordered a time-bound review of recommendations relating to deaths in government-run and aided ashram schools. It also approved replacing the direct benefit transfer (DBT) system with mess facilities in government hostels in cities and at the district level.