Food Minister Agri S.S. Krishnamoorthy on Thursday asked Food and Civil Supplies officials to find ways to curb smuggling of rice to neighbouring States and diversion of kerosene.
Chairing a review meeting, he said that special checks should be carried out on vehicles in border districts such as Chennai, Tiruvallur, Krishnagiri, Vellore, Dharmapuri, Kanyakumari, Tirunelveli, Tuticorin and Coimbatore to prevent the smuggling of rice, which was rampant during the past few years.
The free rice was meant to be distributed to cardholders and officials should ensure that it reached the beneficiaries.
The Chief Minister had ordered the officials to maintain strict vigil and to initiate action against the offenders.
To ensure that kerosene is supplied to genuine cardholders, officials from Civil Supplies Department will start verifying the address of cardholders with gas agency distributors from Monday. After verification, the ration card will be stamped about their eligibility.
Those possessing double cylinders will not get kerosene. Those with single cylinder will be entitled to three litres in Corporation limits and village panchayats. About four to five parameters have been prescribed as entitlement for procurement of kerosene, officials said.
The meeting was attended by Food Secretary V.K. Jeyakodi, Civil Supplies Corporation Managing Director Veera Shanmugha Moni, Additional DGP Civil Supplies (CID) T. Radhakrishnan, Consumer Protection, Commissioner K. Balachandran and other officials.
Talking to The Hindu , Mr. Balachandran said that on the first day of the launch of the free rice scheme, about 24.48 lakh cardholders procured 49,992 tonnes of rice. This was seven per cent of the total entitlement of 3.81 lakh metric tonnes for 1.83 crore cardholders.
About 90,110 kg free rice was distributed through Triplicane Urban Co-operative Society (TUCS) shops in Chennai to 4,350 card holders against 50,000 kilos in the recent past.
