It’s full meals, but system needs fixing

As the Karnataka government’s flagship scheme Anna Bhagya — that provides up to 30 kg of rice to poor families at Re. 1 a kg — completes one year, the response to the scheme appears mixed.

As the Congress government’s flagship scheme Anna Bhagya — that provides up to 30 kg of rice to poor families at Re. 1 a kg — completes one year, the response to the scheme appears mixed.

While a welfare scheme that guarantees food at subsidised price has won many accolades, reports from the ground suggest that there are glitches and large-scale misappropriations that need to be urgently fixed.

Assured meals

Honnamma, Nagarathna and Parvathamma, below the poverty line (BPL) card holders who had come to collect their quota of ration at a fair price shop in Saraswathipuram in Mysore on Wednesday, were unanimous in saying that Anna Bhagya had indeed assured them “full meals” at a low cost.

Similar was the sentiment of Khaja Bi, a homemaker residing in a one-room thatched house at Rajapur on the outskirts of Gulbarga. “We used to spend more than Rs. 500 a month on rice, wheat and sugar required for my family of four children and husband. Now we spend Rs. 43.50,” she said. Describing Anna Bhagya as a “saviour”, Pandit Lakshman Rao Bairamadagi, a security guard, asked, “Can we buy rice paying Rs. 50 to Rs. 60 a kg?”

The rot within

However, the chorus on the need to stem the rot within the public distribution system (PDS) is also increasing. At the policy level, critics said the government was trying to cut down on the number of beneficiaries in the name of “weeding out” bogus cards, often resulting in exclusion of the really poor. On the other hand, supporters of politicians or friends and relatives of government officers have easier access to BPL cards.

There have also been misappropriations at the local level, with reported cases of rice meant for the scheme getting diverted, fair price shop owners charging more than the fixed price or forcing beneficiaries to buy other provisions, and beneficiaries reselling rice in the market.

Indubai Jani of Rajapur said the BPL card holders who bought rice and sugar were forced to shell out Rs. 75 for tea powder or two soaps. “If we resist, the foodgrains are not given,” she said.

Rashtriya Kisan Sangha State general secretary Konche Shivarudrappa argued that there were networks of fake beneficiaries that sell foodgrains received under the scheme. “More than eight food inspectors and other staff in the Food and Civil Supplies Department in and around Chitradurga and Davangere have been suspended in the last one year on the charge of misappropriation,” he said. In Hassan, within a month of the scheme being launched last year, about 305 quintals of rice worth over Rs. 9 lakh was found in a private rice mill.

A resident of Aduvalli in Hassan, who wished not to be named, said she sold about 10 kg of rice at Rs. 10 a kg every month because their staple was ragi. Many families were found to be selling rice for Rs. 10 to Rs. 14 a kg in Hubli–Dharwad too because it is not the staple. In Mangalore, Judith Rita from Vamanjoor said that though she gets parboiled rice now in the fair price shop, she uses it only to make dosa because it was procured from Andhra Pradesh and very different from the local variety.

Future plans

Harsh Gupta, Commissioner, Food and Civil Supplies, said the focus in future would be on direct and decentralised procurement of grain. “We have submitted a proposal for procurement of five types of grain — rice, parboiled rice, jowar, ragi and other minor millets from Raitha Samparka Kendras at hobli levels. We expect to procure a majority of our monthly demand through this route,” Mr. Gupta said.

The department is consulting farmers’ groups and economic experts to come out with a permanent mechanism to ensure regular supply. “Local procurement will address the issue of fluctuating prices. Being the primary buyer in an agricultural produce market will help us regulate the buying-selling process and stop the middlemen menace,” Mr. Gupta said.

(Compiled by Bageshree S. with inputs from T.V. Sivanandan in Gulbarga, Rishikesh Bahadur Desai in Bidar, N. Dinesh Nayak in Dharwad, Shankar Bennur in Mysore, Sathish G.T. in Hassan, Raghava M. in Mangalore, and Pradeepkumar Kadkol in Chitradurga)