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The Ministry of Education gave the Lok Sabha the state-wise allocation of foodgrains under PM POSHAN for the last three years: 26,81,575.28 MT in 2023-24, 25,31,266.40 MT in 2024-25 and 24,15,007.25 MT in 2025-26.
In 2025-26 Bihar received the largest allocation at 3,01,148.29 MT, ahead of Uttar Pradesh at 2,97,399.06 MT, Maharashtra at 2,49,637.79 MT and West Bengal at 2,29,596.92 MT.
The Centre provides 100% assistance for the cost of foodgrains, transportation and Management, Monitoring and Evaluation; the foodgrains themselves come from the Food Corporation of India, allocated bi-annually by the Department of School Education and Literacy with the concurrence of the Department of Food and Public Distribution.
In a separate reply on Samagra Shiksha, the Ministry reported that in 2025-26 Rs 2,871.95 crore was spent on infrastructure, Rs 13,508.69 crore on teacher salaries, Rs 2,353.23 crore on free textbooks and Rs 3,871.02 crore on free uniforms, tracked through the PRABANDH portal.
Education cess collection stood at Rs 63,252.86 crore in 2024-25 and Rs 65,890.50 crore in 2025-26, routed through the Prarambhik Shiksha Kosh and the Madhyamik and Uchchtar Shiksha Kosh.
Provide one hot cooked nutritious meal to children in Bal Vatika and Classes I to VIII in Government and Government-aided schools
Key: The renamed and expanded Mid Day Meal Scheme — the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved PM POSHAN on 29 September 2021, extending coverage to pre-primary/Bal Vatika children for the first time; the Mid Day Meal Scheme itself was launched in 1995. It is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme implemented in partnership with States and UTs, with the Centre bearing 100% of foodgrain, transport and MME costs
Integrated Centrally Sponsored Scheme for school education from pre-school to Class XII
Key: Supports school buildings, additional classrooms, laboratories, libraries, hostels, residential schools, drinking water and sanitation, electrification, smart classrooms, ICT laboratories and digital learning resources; State annual plans (AWP&B) are appraised by the Project Approval Board and funds released against conditions including pace of expenditure, receipt of State share and audited utilisation certificates
Track physical and financial progress of Samagra Shiksha interventions
Key: Project Appraisal, Budgeting Achievements and Data Handling System, with a data visualisation dashboard showing monthly status of expenditure across major interventions
Reserve funds through which education cess proceeds are routed to elementary and to secondary/higher education respectively
Key: PSK utilisation rose to Rs 48,049.09 crore in 2025-26 while MUSK utilisation was Rs 10,314.31 crore — the split shows how heavily cess money is weighted towards elementary education
Under Article 270 the net proceeds of most Union taxes are divided between the Centre and the States according to the Finance Commission's formula — this shared amount is the 'divisible pool'. But cesses and surcharges levied for specific purposes under a law made by Parliament are expressly kept out of that pool. The Centre collects and retains them entirely, spending them through earmarked reserve funds. In education, those funds are the Prarambhik Shiksha Kosh for elementary education and the Madhyamik and Uchchtar Shiksha Kosh for secondary and higher education. This is exactly why the growing share of cesses and surcharges in Union revenue is a live Centre-State fiscal dispute: every rupee raised as a cess rather than as a tax is a rupee the States receive no share of, even though they deliver most of the services it funds.
Simple Analogy: Ordinary taxes go into a joint account the Centre and States both draw from. A cess goes into the Centre's own labelled jar — spent on the labelled purpose, but not split.
Supplies foodgrains for PM POSHAN at not less than Fair Average Quality, keeps stocks in its depots and Principal Distribution Centres in the North East Region, appoints a State-wise Nodal Officer and retains samples for verification against quality complaints
Approves the foodgrain allocation under PM POSHAN and appraises State Annual Work Plans and Budgets under Samagra Shiksha
The apex monitoring body for the scheme
Monitor scheme delivery at State and district level; a separate District Level Committee under the guidelines is chaired by the senior-most Member of Parliament of the district and meets quarterly
Concurs in the bi-annual foodgrain allocation made by the Department of School Education and Literacy
The Act gives statutory entitlement to a mid-day meal for children in the eligible age group, which is why PM POSHAN's foodgrain supply chain is tied to FCI and the Department of Food and Public Distribution rather than run independently by the education ministry
PM POSHAN sits alongside POSHAN Abhiyaan and the ICDS/Anganwadi system as India's child-nutrition architecture; the school meal is the intervention that also drives enrolment and attendance
FAQ is the minimum grain quality standard used across FCI operations, from procurement at Minimum Support Price to distribution under the PDS and PM POSHAN — a term that recurs across the agriculture and food security syllabus
The rising share of cess and surcharge revenue, which stays outside the divisible pool, is the standing State grievance in every Finance Commission cycle
GS Paper 2 > Governance > Welfare Schemes; GS Paper 3 > Fiscal Federalism
General Awareness > Government Schemes
General Awareness > Schemes and Polity
General Awareness > Government Schemes and Budget
School nutrition schemes and the cess-versus-divisible-pool question both recur regularly across Prelims and Mains
Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman — the renamed and expanded Mid Day Meal Scheme, approved by the CCEA on 29 September 2021, covering Bal Vatika and Classes I-VIII
The pre-primary year just before Class I, brought under school-meal coverage when the scheme became PM POSHAN
The minimum quality standard for foodgrains issued by FCI, verified by joint inspection with the District Collector's nominee
The reserve fund through which education cess proceeds earmarked for elementary education are utilised; MUSK is its secondary and higher education counterpart
Project Appraisal, Budgeting Achievements and Data Handling System — the Department of School Education and Literacy's portal tracking Samagra Shiksha physical and financial progress