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In Rajasthan, Rs 55 lakh recovered from govt officials in bid to clean PDS list
The district supply officers (DSOs), who are in charge of PDS in the districts, were asked to check at the backend for duplicate cards and fake units.
The Rajasthan state food department has launched a campaign to cleanse the National Food Security Act (NFSA) list of beneficiaries and removed more than 100,000 cards. The department has recovered Rs 55 lakh from government servants, who lifted PDS grains despite not being eligible for it.
“We have cancelled 104,343 duplicate ration cards since May 8,” said food secretary Siddharth Mahajan. The cancelled cards include 70,058 households eligible for PDS grains under the NFSA. The remaining cards were of households that are ineligible under the food security law.
Mahajan said around two months ago, the food department ordered district collectors to wean NFSA lists after it found out that fake units (individuals) were added in many ration cards. “Around two months ago, we started looking at ration cards in which three or more units were added recently, after complaints that fake units (individuals) were being added,” he said.
There are at least 400,000 such cards in the state. The department data showed that there are 70,000 ration cards from which 94,155 units have been removed. Units are added to ration cards by block development officers (BDOs) or executive officers of urban local bodies.
The food secretary said this was part of the government’s larger plan of cleaning the NFSA list. “We have also removed thousands of government servants and recovered Rs 55 lakh from them,” he said.
The district supply officers (DSOs), who are in charge of PDS in the districts, were asked to check at the backend for duplicate cards and fake units. In Rajasthan, around 70% of the population is NFSA beneficiaries and there are 26,816 fair price shops (FPSs) in the state.
