Hyderabad, Oct. 13: The state launched the extension of its mid-day meals scheme (covering up to Class X) in all the high schools on Monday. The minister for school education, Mr Damodara Rajanarasimha, formally launched the scheme at a school in Medak. Though the school education officials claimed that they have successfully implemented the extension of the mid-day meals in 99 per cent of the high schools, the teacher unions, which monitored the scheme, alleged that not even 40 per cent of the schools could provide meals to students up to Class X. The main problem was the significant rise in student numbers. "Till now, the scheme applied only to primary and upper primary schools. Each such schools had, at best, 60 students who availed the scheme. With the extension of the scheme to the high schools, the number of student beneficiaries rose to as much as 20,000. The cooking agencies failed to handle the surge of students," said Mr Narayana, general secretary, AP United Teachers Federation. Moreover, companies which supplied LPG (as per domestic rates till now) have decided to collect commercial rates. As a result cooking agencies have refused to buy cylinders saying that it is not viable. However, director of school education, Mr Bhanu Murthy, termed the problems as "initial hiccups." The scheme failed to take off at the Girl