BANGI: The Higher Education Ministry has introduced the Menu Siswa Rahmah initiative with meals priced at RM3.50 at 20 public universities and polytechnics nationwide.
Its minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin said the initiative will benefit as many as 320,000 students from the B40 category.
He said the ministry always supports and tries to help poor students, especially those in the B40 group, so they were not affected in furthering their studies due to the hardships faced by their families.
"Today I would like to state that the ministry has received a commitment from all 20 public universities and polytechnics involving a total of 235 stalls to provide meals at RM3.50.
"The initiative and participation of the vendors to support programmes such as the Menu Siswa Rahmah will help undergraduates deal with the high cost of living," he said.
He said this to reporters after conducting a review of the Menu Siswa Rahmah initiative by Brahim's Dewina Group & UKM at the Randau Rasa Cafeteria at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) here today.
Commenting further, he said that the initiative could be implemented due to the fact that public universities did not charge stall rental costs to traders, which involved a cost of RM3 million per year while at the polytechnics this involved a cost of RM700,000 per year.
"By not charging rent, the price of food can be reduced and the food provided can be sold to students for only RM3.50," he said.
However, he said, the public universities and polytechnics would still provide the Menu Rahmah priced at RM5 for those who can afford it.
"To distinguish eligible students for the Siswa Rahmah Menu, the public universities and polytechnics will provide tokens to the students from the B40 category," he said.
Meanwhile, when asked if the ministry was still continuing with the moratorium on the increase of tuition fees, he said there was currently no proposal to raise fees.
"So far we have no proposal to increase tuition fees," he said.
When asked if students can be political on campus, he said there was no problem in doing so.
"There is no no problem with politics on campus. So far, have you heard of any students being arrested?" he said.