'Eat Right Campus' certificate for UP jail

Muzaffarnagar (UP), May 19 (IANS) The Muzaffarnagar Jail in Uttar Pradesh has been awarded the 'Eat Right Campus' certificate by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAl) for providing healthy diets to the inmates.

The certificate was issued after multiple visits were made by the officials to check the standards.

Sitaram Sharma, superintendent of the prison, said, "The staff underwent a training programme to train cooks with an aim to promote safe, healthy, and sustainable food in the jail campus. Under this programme, chefs from a five-star hotel visited the jail and trained the staff to prepare healthy and hygienic food."

He said, "Various types of remedial programmes are being run for the moral and mental upliftment of prisoners.

Cleanliness and beautification of the area are done regularly, and jail radio is also aired for the inmates' entertainment. A library with hundreds of books has also been set up. We have been awarded the certificate because of such initiatives," he added.

Muzaffarnagar district magistrate Arvind Malappa Bangari said, "Earlier, the jail got certification from ISO, a Geneva-based NGO, and now, it has a new achievement in its name. The jail administration was engaged in efforts for a long time to improve the quality of food, so the chef of the city's famous Solitaire Inn trained them."

Notably, the jail had recently hit headlines after authorities installed 24 complaint boxes outside almost every barrack.

"Initially, we barely had any takers for these complaint boxes. Things changed when we started acting upon the complaints that we received. That increased the prisoners' faith," said the jail superintendent.

--IANS

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