The civil supplies department in Andhra Pradesh is, more often than not, in the news for all the wrong reasons. This time, the revelation that it has presided over the generation and distribution of lakhs more ration cards than the total number of families in the state has come as a shocker, prompting the State Food Commission, constituted under the National Food Security Act, to ring the alarm bells.
As per official records, 1.58 crore white ration cards—meant for Below Poverty Line families with an annual income of less than `75,000—were issued as on date as against the 1.39 crore families in the state. The Commission, which took stock of the situation, wondered why the government wasn’t using the data collected from families across the state under the Smart Pulse Survey for rationalising the public distribution system. The Commission also pointed to the missing numbers. For instance, in Kurnool rural and urban areas, 1.12 lakh cards were issued, but as many as 58,000 actual beneficiaries couldn’t be traced.
Terming it an alarming situation, the panel has advised the government to pay attention and indicated that rice distributed under the public distribution system is being diverted and exported to other states and even countries. That all of this is happening despite an all-out end-to-end digitisation, besides installation of GPS devices to track the supply chain, is a telling comment on the implementation of these measures. Privately, officials admit that rice intended to benefit the poor is being diverted by middlemen, millers and merchants and worse, sold off to beer manufacturers in neighbouring states.
It is high time the state government woke up to this reality and ordered an immediate probe to plug the loopholes. Unfortunately, in its zeal to cover as many people as possible, the government, instead of righting the wrongs, has given the green signal to issue more ration cards. It will only be an exercise in futility if it goes ahead without cleaning up the mess.
