The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) are fighting to claim credit for free disbursement of food grains in Odisha, with the BJP now deciding to put up posters of prime minister Narendra Modi at public distribution centres (fair price shops) to claim ownership of the scheme.
Odisha will go to polls in April-May 2024, and the BJP is keen to win the state from BJD, which has been in power for the past 25 years.
Subsidised food grain distribution in Odisha is considered a reason for chief minister Biju Patnaik’s success.
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In the first week of January, the central government announced that it would bear the entire cost of foodgrains given under the National Food Security Act (NFSA). On Friday, the BJP in Odisha said the party would put up huge banners of PM Modi at public distribution centres where rice is distributed to the beneficiaries.
“We are planning to put huge banners of PM Modi with the words ‘Free 5 kg rice, thanks to PM Modi’. This is not the Prime Minister’s call but it is our own decision,” said the leader of the opposition Jainarayan Mishra.
{{/usCountry}}“We are planning to put huge banners of PM Modi with the words ‘Free 5 kg rice, thanks to PM Modi’. This is not the Prime Minister’s call but it is our own decision,” said the leader of the opposition Jainarayan Mishra.
{{/usCountry}}“All these years the state government misled people that they are giving the rice and not the centre. So BJP plans to put up banners and posters of PM Modi at fair-price shops and public distribution centres,” he said.
Beginning this month, the centre stopped the ‘Pradhan Mantri Gareeb Kalyan Anna Yojana’ under which free foodgrain was provided since the onset of the Covid pandemic in 2020, but announced that it would give the foodgrain under NFSA free of cost.
Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said around 1.87 lakh tonnes of rice will be provided to 3.25 crore people of Odisha every month.
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Earlier, the ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution wrote to all states to ensure that the NFSA beneficiaries get “print receipt” that prominently indicates “free foodgrain distribution and subsidy” borne by the centre to let the beneficiaries know that they are receiving free foodgrains under the central scheme.
In Odisha, where the below poverty line (BPL) beneficiaries were getting rice at ₹1/kg, the centre was providing a subsidy of ₹34.28 per kg while the state government gave ₹2/kg till December last year. Rice given under NFSA costs ₹37.28 per kg.
BJP leader Golak Mohapatra said the state government not just fooled the people by making them believe that the NFSA scheme was its own, it also slashed the rice meant for people in the Antodaya scheme. “While the central government’s Antodaya Scheme is meant to provide 35 kg rice per month to BPL families, the state government was providing 25 kg,” alleged Mohapatra.
BJD leader Debi Mishra said his party is not surprised by the decision of the BJP to put up banners of Modi as they did the same thing when the Ujjwala scheme was launched.
“Petrol pumps and busy squares had huge banners of Modi telling people that it was giving cooking gas connection free of cost under the Ujjwala scheme. After all these years, how many of the Ujjwala beneficiaries are able to afford the gas cylinders? BJP only knows how to announce schemes ahead of polls but does little to execute schemes well,” said Mishra.
Mishra said, “We are giving free rice under our own ‘State Food Security Act’, which covers nine lakh people.”