Owing to poor coverage of Aadhaar, coupled with severe cyclone Phailin and two back-to-back floods leaving trails of devastation in 18 districts in Odisha, the State Government finds it difficult to implement the Direct Benefit Transfer of lPG (DBTl) scheme within the slated timeframe and has, therefore, requested the Union Government to defer its implementation by at least three months, sources said.
Chief Secretary JK Mohapatra has written to Secretary of Union Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas Vivek Rae in this regard.
The DBTl was to be launched in November in four districts, Khurda, Puri, Cuttack and Balangir, while the facility was to be extended to three more districts, Baleswar, Bhadrak and Sundargarh, from January 1, 2014.
Under the DBTl, the lPG consumers are required to link their Aadhaar numbers with their lPG consumer numbers and their bank accounts to avail of the subsidy amount directly in their bank accounts while purchasing domestic lPG cylinders, both subsidised as well as non-subsidised, at market price.
Mohapatra, who recently reviewed the status of coverage under Aadhaar, found that though 239 lakh persons had enrolled themselves with their biometric for Aadhaar, only 107 lakh Aadhaar numbers have been generated.
The review further revealed that less than 40 per cent of the generated Aadhaars have been communicated to individuals due to problems with the India Post, the fact admitted by the UIDAI authorities.
Secondly, it was also found that the enrolling agency of Registrar General of India (RGI) through the ECIl was yet to upload the data for about 77 lakh persons.
Keeping in view the current status of Aadhaar coverage, the State Government has decided to set up Enrolment Centres at lPG distributor points and Permanent Enrolment Centres at block/tehsil Headquarters of eight districts with active support of the Director of Census Operations, Odisha.
However, the Phailin that hit the State on October 12 and the subsequent two rounds of floods threw a spanner in the Aadhaar generation process because the administration was fully engaged in relief and restoration operations. The Enrolment Centres are expected to be operational by the end of November.
In this situation, the State Government has requested the Union Government to put off the launching of the DBTl in the State by at least three months for both the phases, said official sources.