On 15 February 2020, The Governor of Tamil Nadu - Shri Banwarilal Purohit, and Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu - Shri K. Palaniswami, laid the foundation stone for The Akshaya Patra Foundation’s centralised kitchen starting in Chennai. This kitchen will be recognised under the ''Kaalai Unavu Thittam'' (breakfast scheme), in order to serve the students of Chennai Corporation schools by the NGO. 

The Governor expressed that he was delighted to be there for the Bhoomi Pooja of the Centralised kitchen for Kaalai Unavu Thittam for school children. He also added that the momentous occasion will help take a step further in the direction of fulfilling the nutritional requirements of the beneficiary students. He went on to further add that after noticing the operational process of Akshaya Patra Foundation in Guwahati and Nagpur along with their track-record in the last 20 years, it was the best way to launch the breakfast programme. The success of the breakfast programme had convinced him to find and extend the scheme to more than 12,000 Corporation school students. He also mentioned that the Foundation has grown from feeding Bengaluru’s 1,500 children in 2000 to being the largest Non-profit organization implementing the Mid-Day Meal Programme providing mid-day meals to 1.8 million children in 12 States and 2 Union Territories of India every day. The Governor of Tamil Nadu added that the Raj Bhavan would continue its support for education of under-privileged children of Tamil Nadu, India. 

After the success of the breakfast programme, The Greater Chennai Corporation gave permission to Akshaya Patra to set up a centralised kitchen in the city. The plan is projected to cost £5,35,000 approximately. With the aim of show its support for the Foundation, an MoU was signed, dated 25 January.