Alleging that the district administration has adopted faulty ration card verification process, a large number of people from Birgaon staged a demonstration at the Collectorate here on Tuesday.
The protesters said that the verification process would cancel about 80 per cent of the ration cards holders and poor families would have nothing to eat in such a situation.They demanded to restore the previous criteria of verification of ration cards and threatened to intensify the protest if their demands were not considered.
The protesters including men and women led by Ikram Ahmed and Congress leader Chaya Verma reached the Collectorate on Tuesday evening.They raised slogans against the administration for depriving them of their fundamental right. They said that the ration cards of the poor families should not be cancelled. When no officer came to attend them, they sat on dharna inside the premises.
Ahmed said the work of verification of ration cards was being done in their area. About 300 ration cards have been cancelled and the poor families dependent on the ration cards were being denied ration.The families are on the verge of starvation as they are not in a capacity to purchase ration at the market rate. Many families are on the verge of starvation, they claimed. If the process of verification of ration cards is continued, the ration cards of majority of people will be cancelled.
“The criteria should be changed and the previous criteria should be restored for verification,” they demanded. They threatened to take the protest to roads and gherao the Chief Minister if their demands are overlooked.It is pertinent to mention that the process of verification of ration cards is going on war footing in the State and a large number of ration card holders have been found ineligible in the process.Strict instructions have been issued by the government for verification of ration cards.