Parliamentary panel seeks more food grain quality control cells

Almost a decade since the Food Security Act 2013 was passed, India has had only 11 Quality Control Cells (QCC) to inspect the quality of food grains procured for central schemes, a parliamentary panel has noted. To cut back on the loss of food grains, the Committee has now asked the Centre to have such Cells across all states.

“The Committee feels that the number of QCCs is too less in the wake of implementation of the National Food Security Act, 2013, which has been implemented in all states/UTs of the country under which a large proportion of the population is entitled to receive highly subsidised food grains,” the panel headed by TMC MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay has recommended.

While procured foodgrains in godowns of the Food Corporation of India go through an inspection by FCI as well as the quality control mechanisms in the Department of Food and Public Distribution, the panel said that there are many complaints of beneficiaries getting inferior quality of foodgrains.

"The government’s toll-free round-the-clock helpline numbers of 1967 and 1800 have not been able to solve the problem," the panel said.

“The Committee strongly recommends that the Department should make independent surprise visits and inspections at Fair Price Shops (FPSs). The Committee also desires that CCTV monitoring of FPSs can also be helpful to monitor the distribution,” the panel said, adding that the helplines, too, should be made operational.

Pilferage, as well as substandard food grains, are the main issues that the public distribution system faces.

During 2018-19, 2019-20 and 2020-21, among samples in FCI godowns, 46, 142 and 78 samples, respectively, were found to be of sub-standard quality. During the same time periods, the number of such samples in Central Warehousing Corporation godowns was 25, 17 and 57, respectively.