Food grain quota down, but it's free for poor

Siddaramaiah, who is saddled by the burden of Anna Bhagya scheme, has decided to reduce the food grain quota to BPL families. At the same time, he has decided to distribute the food grains free of cost to the poor.

He has announced that henceforth unit system will be followed to distribute food grains to BPL families. This also means that per person, 5 kg of grain would be distributed. It could be rice, wheat or ragi. Now, one person is getting 10 kg of grain and the maximum for a family is 30 kg.

The unit system, according to Minister of State for Food and Civil Supplies Dinesh Gundu Rao, would help in curbing diversion of food grains by the card holders.

In addition, a kg of palm oil at Rs 25 and a kg of iodised salt at Rs 2 will be sold to BPL card holders. The government announced that the department will sell ration to those families which are above poverty line also. However, this will not be as highly subsidised as for BPL card holders.

For APL ration card holders (identified as non-priority households under the Food Security Act), 5 kg of food grain - 3 kg rice and 2 kg wheat - for one member and 10 kg food grain - 5 kg rice and 5 kg wheat - for families having more than one member will be distributed. A kg of rice will cost Rs 15 and wheat Rs 10.

The proposed allocation for the department is Rs 2,120 crore for the coming year, which is about Rs 3,000 crore in the current year. With regard to ration to APL families, he said the card holders would be given two months’ time to register with the department to claim the facility.