Lucknow: A grading system will be adopted to rate all the Uttar Pradesh schools that are providing mid-day meals (MDM) to their students, an official said on Tuesday.

The schools performing well as per the gradation system will be entitled to incentives and other awards.

"The move is aimed at improving the food quality of the popular meal programme in the state," state's MDM director Santosh Yadav told sources.

According to the new gradation system, the MDM department has decided to allot points on the availability and quality of food, resources available with the schools, hygiene and maintenance of records about beneficiaries.

"40 points will be given for food availability, 15 points for quality of food, 10 points for availability of resources, 15 points for maintaining cleanliness, while another 20 points for record keeping," Yadav said.

The school scoring between 75-100 points will get grade 'A' while those between 60-74 will get 'B' grade. Likewise, schools getting 50-59 points will receive 'C' grade and those scoring 35-49 points will get 'D' grade.

Complaints regarding poor food being supplied under MDM were received about three weeks back from a few districts, including Allahabad and Barabanki.

Under the MDM scheme, the government schools provide lunch to students. In Uttar Pradesh, the scheme covers about 150,000 schools. IANS