The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has made a huge impact on the life of the poor and people who come under the marked poverty line by impacting their jobs and in worse conditions causing a loss in jobs. This situation has been becoming worse as the pandemic has taken cover all over India. This has brought the situations of the poor residents of the country in limelight and needs to be solved and provide all the supplies and help to the needy. Let’s find it out by reading some facts and enriching the learning process.
The PDS is a part of Indian food security system, that was established by the Government of India under the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution to distribute food and non-food items to India’s poor at subsidised rates. This scheme was first started on 14 January 1945, during the Second World War, and was launched in the current form in June 1947. It was again revived in the wake of acute food shortage during the early 1960s, before the green revolution. It involves two types, RPDS and TPDS.
The Center and State Government share responsibilities to make this System more beneficial and can reach to maximum needy citizens.
·The objective of establishing it: –
The main objective to establish the PDS was to provide every poor and needy people with food grains (wheat, rice, sugar) and essential fuels like kerosene (to cook the food grains) at a fair stabilized prices and can be made easily available all over the country of India.
The major commodities were sold with the help of a network established by the Government of India called Fair Price shop or Ration shop that sold these goods at a subsidised price called Issue price.
The other goals to achieve were: –
–To move towards a Nation with Zero Hunger.
–To secure the Fundamental Right to Food of Indian Citizens.
–Ensuring Food Security & Buffer Stock.
–To reduce the burden of food subsidy and targeting it better to the people with a real need.
The Agency that provides food grains to the PDS is the Food Corporation of India (FCI).
· What is the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS)?
The TPDS was launched by the Government of India in June 1997 and was an attempt to focus more on the poor. The Government of India gave responsibility to the states that they were required to formulate and implement foolproof arrangements for identification of the poor & non-poor for delivery of food grains and its distribution in a transparent and accountable manner at Fair Price Shops (FPS) Level.
Protocols were made to identify the poor and non-poor for the states to identify them as per the State-Wise poverty estimates of the planning commission.
Under the operations of TPDS, the beneficiaries were divided into two categories: –
1. Households Below the poverty line (BPL)
2. Households Above the poverty line (APL)
Central Government is responsible for: –
1. Procurement of food grains
2. Allocation of food grains
3. Transportation of food grains to designated depots of Food Corporation of India (FCI).
State Government is responsible for: –
1. Allocation and Distribution of food grains within the state.
2. Identification of eligible beneficiaries.
3. Issuance of ration cards.
· Evolution in the PDS: –
Many reforms & evolutions took place to strengthen and streamline the PDS. It helped to improve the reach of major commodities to Far-Flung, Hilly, Remote and inaccessible areas by eradicating the corruptions and making it more transparent, accountable manner and dividing into categories.
The evolutions that took place were as: –
– The Revamped Public Distribution System (RPDS) was launched in June 1992 to increase the reach of the benefits.
– The Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) was launched in June 1997 to divide the beneficiaries into two categories as mentioned above in the TPDS.
– In December 2000, Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) was launched to identify the poorest of the poor families among the BPL families covered under the TPDS. They are protected with 35kg per household per month at highly subsidised rates of ₹ 2/kg for wheat and ₹ 3/kg for rice with the help of Antyodaya Ration Card.
– In September 2013, Parliament enacted the National Food Security Act, 2013. The Act relies largely on the existing TPDS to deliver food grains as legal entitlements to poor households. This marks a shift by making the right to food a justiciable right.
– And as per the latest evolution in the PDS, in June 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic Hon. Prime Minister of India Shri Narendra Modi launched a scheme called One Nation One Ration Card. The step taken is of great significance as it helps millions of citizens to get their food supplies as per the National Food Security Act (NFSA). By this scheme, the beneficiaries of ration card can avail their share of food grains and ration from any Fair Price Shops & Ration Shops all around the Country of India.
· Challenges faced procuring the PDS.
Many challenges were faced to fulfil the needs of the poor and needy people by the PDS, be it a natural Challenge or a man-made. The PDS in India has been criticised on various counts.
– Identification of beneficiaries: – In this proper identification of poor and non-poor needs to be done properly so the needs of the needy can be fulfilled properly. The targeting a mechanism like TPDS, RPDS and many schemes are prone to inclusion and exclusion errors and led to the entitled beneficiaries not getting food grains while the ineligible are getting undue benefits.
– Leakage of food grains: – This issue has two contributors that consist of transportation leakage and black marketing by Fair price shop owners. PDS suffers a large number of losses and leakages of food grains and on-average of 36% leakage of PDS supplies at all India Level.
– Issues with procurement: – A proper procurement of incoming food grains should be equally shared among the PDS and Buffer-Stock but due to Open-ended Procurement causes all incoming grains accepted even if the buffer stock is filled, creates a shortage in the open market.
– Issues with the storage and environment: – In the performance audit done by CAG has revealed that a serious shortage is noticed in the government’s storage capacity. Due to this, the extra food grains are kept at the delivery stations without any preparations and lack of adequate cover shortage leads to rotting of food grains. This leads to a rise in the price of food grains in the open market after the existing stock finishes. The over-emphasis on attaining self-sufficiency and a surplus in water-intensive food grains is environmentally unsustainable.
Sources: –
– NCERT Class 9 Economics Chapter-9 (https://ncert.nic.in/textbook/pdf/iess204.pdf)
– https://niti.gov.in/planningcommission.gov.in/docs/reports/peoreport/peo/peo_tpds.pdf
– https://dfpd.gov.in/pds-tpds.htm
– And data from Newspapers.
– AYUSH JHA (BVR Gypsy)