Two years since Food Act, states dragging feet in implementing it

It has been over two years since the passage of National Food Security Act, but many states are dragging feet in its effective implementation, even in the face massive drought-like conditions. From duplication of beneficiaries to bogus ration cards, preparedness in allocation, movement and storage of grains as well as erroneous registrations, problems are plenty. In Maharashtra, according to the recent Controller Auditor General (CAG) report, anomalies in erroneous ration cards were claimed to be corrected by merely affixing stamps on existing ration cards under different categories.

In Haryana, the central government has set a threshold of a population of 1.26 crore, who are eligible for receiving 5 kilos of food grains at the subsidized rate of Rs 3/2/1 per kg for wheat/rice/coarse grains per person, as per data pulled out from socio-economic caste census (SECC) in 2011. As opposed to this threshold, department of food and supplies in Haryana has drawn a number of 1.40 crore beneficiaries. "We realized that there have been errors in collecting data of the beneficiaries. The data entry operators have fed the same Aadhar number for more than one person leading to a false increase in beneficiaries," said Subhash Sharma, Project Manager, Department of Food and Supplies, Haryana. "We have identified five lakh duplicate entries. We are yet to identify an additional 8 lakh duplicate entries and weed them out."

In Assam, while the central government has charted out a requirement of 1 lakh 30,000 metric tonnes (MT) of grain under NFSA, the state government of Assam has shown a requirement of 1 lakh 36, 700 MT. "We need more food grain quantity than allotted by GoI. In many houses, families living under one roof have separate kitchens. Also, some names may be wrongly entered. This has led us to conduct a re-survey," said Shukur Ali, Joint Secretary, Department of Food and Civil Supplies, Assam.

The NFSA has been rolled out in 33 states of India except Tamilnadu, Nagaland and Kerala. Of the 33 states that were summoned by NHRC to explain their stand on the delay and loopholes in meting out subsidized food under the act, in a case of poor turnout, only eleven states registered their presence.

Also, in a stark critique of NFSA, Controller and Auditor General of India (CAG) stated in it's first audit report submitted to the Parliament on Friday that states were largely unprepared to handle the logistics of allocation, movement and storage of food grains. "Different states have used patchwork criteria for identifying Below Poverty Line households eligible for subsidies. Re-surveys for apt identification will be required," said Professor Ravi Srivastava, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University.

Also there is a shortage of fair price shops in India. While there are 6 lakh villages in India, there are only 5.35 lakh fair price ration shops for disbursement of food grains.

In a gross case of violence of the act, he centre and states have failed to give monetary benefits of NFSA to pregnant and lactating mothers. The act states that besides meal to pregnant women and lactating mothers during pregnancy and six months after the child birth, such women will also be entitled to receive maternity benefit of not less than Rs. 6,000.

"Failing to do this is a grave violence of Section (4) B of NFSA. Adequate funds should be made available for implementation of maternity benefits," said Indu Capoor, founder of public health NGO Chetna.

"A major impediment in implementation of government schemes is also that the potential beneficiaries are not aware so as how to make use of the schemes," said NHRC chairperson Justice HL Dattu.

"Only supply of food at cheap rates is not solving the problem of malnutrition in India. For at least 150 days in a year, the villagers should consume green leafy vegetables. They should be trained in simple fishery and backyard poultry farming practices," said Dr Rajesh Kumar, Secretary, Ministry of Women and Child Development.

According to last year's budget, up to Rs 1, 24,419 crore for food subsidy in last year's fiscal was earmarked for food subsidy. Of the total food subsidy, nearly Rs 65,000 crore has been earmarked for implementation of National Food Security Act (NFSA) which claims to benefit 82 crore persons in India.