Amending the food grains quota for Madhya Pradesh under the public distribution system, eligible families will now be provided 75 per cent wheat and 25 per cent rice, respectively. Earlier, this was 80 per cent and 20 per cent. The process adopted by Madhya Pradesh to implement the Food Security Act will be replicated in the entire country.
This was stated by Union Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Minister Ramvilas Paswan while distributing eligibility slips to beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act during the Food Security Festival at Seoni today. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Food and Civil Supplies Minister Kunwar Vijay Shah and Farmers Welfare and Agriculture Development Minister Gaurishankar Bisen were present on the occasion.
Paswan said that the Food Security Act could not be implemented in 20 states and 5 Union Territories in the country. Madhya Pradesh has done an unprecedented work by implementing it and Chief Minister Chouhan deserves compliment for this. He said that Chief Minister Chouhan has tried to extend the Act's benefit to maximum number of people by simplifying rules under it. The Centre and the state will work in tandem to develop Madhya Pradesh as an ideal state, he added.
Chouhan said that taxes received from natural resources are being used to extend benefits to the poor through various schemes. The Chief Minister said that Madhya Pradesh state is the first that had started providing subsidised food grains to the poor by launching Mukhyamantri Annapurna Yojana way back in year 2008 much before the passage of the National Food Security Act. Efforts have been made to extend the Act's benefit to the maximum number of people by simplifying some of its provisions.
About 75 per cent people of the state including 25 categories of poor along with SCs and STs and BPl families have been brought under the Act's purview. Eligible beneficiaries have been included after a survey of all people except Class-1, II and III officers and income tax payers.Condition of producing caste certificate for SCs and STs under the scheme has been abolished. Instead, they can avail benefit of the scheme by just giving an affidavit.