The ruling BJD on Wednesday ridiculed State Congress’ decision to launch an FIR campaign against the State Government for alleged diversion of 10 kg of rice under the public distribution system (PDS) to the BPl families in violation of guidelines.
Dismissing the charge as a “political gimmick” by Congress leadership ahead of 2014 general elections with an objective to mislead the people against the BJD Government, BJD vice president and Finance Minister Prasanna Acharya defended the distribution of 25 kg rice against the Central guideline of 35 kg.
Countering the Congress charge, Acharya at a Press conference at the party headquarters here alleged that the State Government had been distributing 25 kg rice to BPl families in order to cover the all the poor people left out in the BPl list due to the reduced allocation of rice by the Center.
Justifying the State Government’s action, Acharya said that though the BPl family list was prepared by the Congress Government headed by JB Patnaik during 1997-98 fixing at 48.58 lakh families, the Central Government basing on the report of the lakedwala Committee constituted by the Planning Commission reduced the number of BPl families to 32.98 lakh and stopped the allocation of BPl rice to the balance 15.6 lakh BPl families. He said the State Government had been continuing the supply of BPl rice to all the 48.58 families identified by door to door survey following the State Cabinet’s decision to cover the poor left out families to ensure food security.
Pratap Keshari Deb said while Congress and BJP ruled States are adopting similar methods like Odisha to provide subsidized rice and wheat to the BPl families in their respective States, the State was doing no wrong.