Lt. Governor Kiran Bedi said on Friday that the Centre had endorsed her stand on Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) of cash in lieu of free rice in a rebuff of Chief Minister V. Narayanasamy’s statement to the contrary.
Mr. Narayanasamy on returning from the GST council meeting in Delhi the other day had stated that Union Minister for Food and Public Distribution Ram Vilas Paswan had agreed in principle to the Puducherry Cabinet’s decision to distribute rice instead of transferring money to the beneficiaries’ accounts.
However, the Lt. Governor said the Ministry of Home Affairs, had, in a letter received at the Raj Nivas on Friday, advised the Union Territory to “continue with DBT (cash) scheme in lieu of distribution of free rice under the Puducherry free rice scheme.” This, according to Ms. Bedi, was a vindication of her advocacy of cash instead of rice as it completely eliminated pilferages and quality issues and offered the freedom of choice to beneficiaries to buy quality foodgrains from the open market for consumption as and when they need. “The purchase of rice by beneficiaries directly from the market will also help the local economy,” she said.
The dispute between the Government and the Raj Nivas over the DBT mode to be adopted had led to the matter being referred to the Centre. According to the Lt. Governor, pending a final decision of the Central Government, she had requested the U.T. administration to adopt DBT (cash method).
Cash equivalent
Accordingly, in this fiscal from April 1, cash equivalent of foodgrains for five months had been released to the bank accounts of BPL families. The Civil Supplies Department is also taking steps to remit cash equivalent into the accounts of APL families, she said. While from 2015, the Central Government was providing free rice at the rate of 5 kg per month to 6.5 lakh beneficiaries of the Union Territory through DBT (as cash equivalent of rice) through remittances into bank accounts of beneficiaries.
The Puducherry government was also implementing a separate scheme to distribute rice free of cost to all families irrespective of their economic status at the rate of 20 kg per month per BPL families and at the rate of 10 kg for APL families.
Ms. Bedi contended that while the scheme was in operation, the Union Territory government had distributed rice intermittently and sporadically due to insufficient funds in the Budget. Since June 2016, the U.T. government has distributed free rice through PDS shops for 17 months and has released cash into the account of beneficiaries for 10 months.
The advocacy of a DBT cash mode also was based on the office of the Lt. Governor receiving a number of complaints regarding the quality of rice and the pilferages and another complaint of reported diversion of government funds by an implementing agency, Ms. Bedi said.
But, while the Lt. Governor directed the Civil Supplies Department to adopt DBT cash method from April 1, 2019, to avoid such problems, a Cabinet meeting in May had resolved to continue distribution of foodgrains in kind at the existing scale of benefits, resulting in the dispute over DBT mode being escalated to the level of the MHA.
