Ration card verification date extended to January 31

Good news for those trying to get their ration cards verified. The deadline has been extended till January 31, reports HT Correspondent.

Good news for those trying to get their ration cards verified. The deadline has been extended till January 31.

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Earlier this year, the government — attempting to weed out the lakhs of bogus ration cards floating around in the system — ordered that all ration cards be verified.

But it botched the programme, with many consumers not even knowing about it, many having to wait hours in long queues outside ration offices (where the verification is to be done), and a general lack of coordination between Public Distribution Shops (PDS) and rationing authorities.

Following a public outcry, the government has extended the programme by a month, ending on January 31, to give harried consumers more time.

“My wife stood in line for more than two hours at the rationing office just to buy a form to cancel the name of the holder, as he had died recently,” said Vile Parle resident Amit Trivedi (34). “The next day, she stood in line for three hours to submit the form.”

Food and Civil Supplies Minister Anil Deshmukh told the media on Tuesday that he had ironed out all these issues.

“The drive’s sole objective is to detect bogus cards. We have instructions from the Centre to conducting such drives once every three years. In the last drive three years ago, we detected some 29 lakh fake cards, 6.5 lakh of them in Mumbai.”

Deshmukh said the criticism was expected, and that it came from people holding fake cards. “Today, I turned down PDS shop owners who were demanding the drive be discontinued,” he said, adding that shop owners have been told to help consumers fill the forms. “Now shops will return a counterfoil as proof of form submission.”

Deshmukh said any member of a family can submit the form – shops earlier insisted only the head of the family could do it.