A day before the ruling BJD’s agitation on Saturday on the issue of rice allocation by the Centre, the BJP State unit on Friday took on the regional party alleging that the stir was aimed at shielding and protecting its tainted Ministers.
Accusing the BJD of misleading the people of the State, party vice-president Bishnu Sethy told reporters here that earlier the Centre was providing rice and wheat ration on the basis of 78.83:21.17 under the Targeted Distribution System (TDSP) which has been retained after the National Food Security Act (NFSA) came into force as the Centre took an in-principle decision to provide rice to the States as per the TDSP statistics.
Sethy said on February 2 last, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had written a letter to Union Food and Public Distribution Minister Ram Vilas Paswan stating that rice and wheat were not being supplied to the State in the ratio 78.83:21.17 under TDSP. The Chief Minister had stated that as per the State’s calculation rice and wheat were being provided to the State in the ratio of 84.74:15.26.
But on February 26, the Paswan replied that no change was made in the rice wheat quota after the NFSA came into force and clarified that the TDSP allocation includes Antnadwyoa Yojana, APl and BPl and additional wheat quota for APl households which is higher than other food grains, Sethy stated.
Sethy said, the State Government, however, by deducting the additional APl quota is making a false claim. Hence, the State Government is misleading people only to divert the attention of people from his corrupt and tainted Ministers.