Aadhaar seeding weeds out fake ration cards

2.62 crore fake ration cards weeded out due to digitisation

 Digitisation of public distribution scheme records has led to weeding out of 2.62 crore fake ration cards from across the country thus helping the government to plug leakage of highly subsidised foodgrain.

 Of the 2.62 crore fake ration cards, 65.54 lakh were detected and deleted in Karnataka alone, followed by 31 lakh in Maharashtra, Consumer Affairs Minister Ramvilas Paswan said here.

 Kerala, Gujarat, Chandigarh, Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur and Meghalaya virtually had no fake ration cards at present.

 The deletion of fake ration cards was possible after the government decided to link the same with Aadhaar numbers.

 The success in deleting fake ration cards has prompted the government to speed up the process of linking all such documents with Aadhaar numbers.

 “So far, 71% of ration cards have been linked with Aadhaar numbers,” Paswan said.
 Andhra Pradesh had 9.76 lakh fake ration cards, Rajasthan (13.23 lakh), Chhatisgarh (10.1 lakh), Tamil Nadu (3.7 lakh) and Madhya Pradesh (1.09 lakh).

Paswan said along with Aadhaar linkage, the government was also aiming for
end-to-end computerisation in the implementation of the National Food Security Act.

 The government had carried out direct benefit transfer in Chandigarh, Puducherry and urban areas of Dadra and Nagar Haveli. In this case, food subsidy is being transferred to the bank account of the beneficiary who then have the choice to buy foodgrain from the open market.

 The government was also focusing on the automation of fair price shops for distribution of foodgrain through an electronic point of sale device which would authenticate the beneficiaries at the time of sale.