Those not drawing rations for 3 months to lose the PDS card

Those not drawing rations for 3 months to lose the PDS card
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After deleting duplicate cards, beneficiaries holding government jobs and of those ineligible under the new specifications of poverty, officials of the department have now shifted focus on identifying buyers of PDS commodities who rarely avail of the provisions.

​Hyderabad: With an aim to reduce anomalies in food security cards, the Civil Supplies Department has begun deleting names of card holders who have failed to buy commodities under the provision of PDS (Public Distribution System) for three
consecutive months.

After deleting duplicate cards, beneficiaries holding government jobs and of those ineligible under the new specifications of poverty, officials of the department have now shifted focus on identifying buyers of PDS commodities who rarely avail of the provisions.

Following the introduction of EPOS (Electronic Point of Sale) system during the last few months in the city, officials were surprised to find that almost 30 per cent of the quota remained unutilised at the fair price shops. Upon probing the issue, they stumbled upon atypical inconsistency wherein thousands of city consumers did not buy commodities under the provision.

It has come to light that at least 20 per cent of the population failed to collect ration from the fair price shops for at least three months at a stretch. Hence, we have decided to clear their names from the beneficiary list,” said an official.

According to estimates, there are about two lakh card holders who have failed to buy commodities regularly. In the last one month, they had removed 10,000 cards after matching details with that of the PDS system.

Officials who started verifying antecedents of the beneficiaries were leaving no stone unturned in ensuring that the genuine beneficiary was provided the card. It may be recalled that the TRS government after coming to power, scrapped the old ration card system and introduced Food Security Card system. Moreover, the eligibility criteria based on income levels has been shifted from below Rs 1 lakh to below Rs 2 lakh.

Later, the EPOS system was introduced in the city and it helped in securing a lot of unused ration. “Those not availing commodities through fair price shop will be removed from the beneficiary list,” cautioned the official.

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