Cloud of insecurity looms over food security for the poor as the State is yet to put in place infrastructure needed for implementation of the provisions enlisted under the Food Security Bill-2013. The ambitious bill for millions of starving people was passed by lok Sabha in August last year.
Even after a lapse of one-year the State Government has shown little seriousness about increasing the storage capacity of grains by fast-tracking construction of as many as 164 warehouses planned in 2010. The warehouses are being constructed at block-level by the Department of Food & Civil Supplies (FCS) and Food Corporation of India (FCI). The FCI is constructing warehouses in public-private-partnership mode.
“Infrastructure is a constraint at this point. We are trying to construct warehouses and about 100
warehouses are under construction,” said Secretary of the department, Dr Pradeep Kumar.
The State has about half the amount of storage required for the proposed quantity of foodgrain - just 1.67-lakh metric tonne (mt) against a need for 3-lakh mt. The Food Corporation of India (FCI) is woefully short on storage capacity with just about one-third the amount of storage capacity required in Jharkhand. Preliminary estimates suggest Jharkhand would require about 23,500 mt of foodgrain every month to provide the food security cover to 47 lakh households in the State.
The Act guarantees 5-kg (25-kg to a family on an average) grain to at least 75 per cent (2.4-crore) population of the State and also envisages streamlining PDS, upgrading information & communication network and alignment of the scheme with Aadhar. Among the changes warranted by the Act, Aadhar linked PDS system has been implemented in some parts of the State but the scheme has hit the roadblock of identification of beneficiaries.
“There is a hurdle of identifying actual beneficiaries in the State. We will complete the process in about a month and half,” maintained the Secretary.
So far, 40 lakh ration cards out of a total 55 lakh have been digitized and less than 30-lakh of those have been verified. Preliminary estimates suggest Jharkhand would require about 23,500 mt foodgrain every month to provide food security to around 47 lakh households.
Meanwhile, state officials of the department are likely to attend a meeting with the Ministry of Food & Civil Supplies on July 4 in Delhi to discuss price rise and possibly state’s readiness to implement the scheme.
“Although the meeting has been called to discuss price rise but we are prepared to take up the issue related to the implementation of the Act also,” said Special Secretary FCS, Ravi Ranjan.
Notably, about `1,680-crore every year is likely to be given by the Centre for BPl families under various heads of food subsidy, whereas the State provides `480 crore and with the latest Food Security Act provisions, another `3,080 crore would come from the Centre.