At the hearing
In the last seven months, Bhanwari Devi (80) has received her share of five kg wheat from a Fair Price Shop (FPS) only once. “The shop is 1.5 km away from my home and the machine doesn’t recognise my thumbprint… I have to buy wheat from the market, which I cannot afford on my old-age pension of Rs 500,” she said.
From Harmada village in Rajasthan’s Rajasmand district, Devi was one of the many people from across 14 states who testified about the “situation of hunger and unemployment” at a national public hearing, organised by Right To Food campaign, at the capital’s Gandhi Peace Foundation on Thursday.
From e-PoS machines failing to authenticate biometrics, and missing names in Aadhaar Cards to families waiting for ration cards to be issued for 15 years and mothers fighting for maternity benefits — the public hearing was a platform to share tales from remote areas of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Rajasthan, and Delhi.
With her baby in tow, Poonam Devi (22) sat at the hearing from 10 am till she finally got to speak at 4 pm. A resident of Mustafabad in UP, she said she has been running from pillar to post to get the first installment of the Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana, a maternity benefit programme. “It’s Rs 5,000 in all, if I get it, I can save it for my baby’s future. He’s eight months old now and I haven’t got a rupee,” she said.
The hearing took place in front of a panel comprising activist Harsh Mander, advocates Usha Ramanathan and Prashant Bhushan, journalists Neha Dixit and Bhasha Singh, among others.
From Rewa district in MP, came Ram Bahadur (62). “Mine is one of the 155 families in my village without a ration card. We have been waiting for 15 years and did get a ‘token’ in 2014 through which we got ration once. I work at a stone quarry and get Rs 100 a day…by coming here, I have lost my wages but maybe we will get ration cards now,” he said.