FP shops reduced to selling rice alone

Hyderabad: The Fair-Price shops run by the Civil Supplies Department have been accused of being gradually reduced to selling subsidised rice only scaling down from the earlier position of supplying nine essential commodities.

Though the FP shops claim to be selling sugar and kerosene to the card-holders, availability of these commodities is not sure. Therefore, the FP shops were selling rice alone. Once in a blue moon, the FP shops sell sugar and kerosene.

In the undivided Andhra Pradesh, the FP shops used to sell nine commodities for a subsidised price of Rs 185. These include 1 kg tur dal, 1 litre palm oil, 1 kg maida, 1 kg wheat atta, 500 gram sugar, 1 kg salt, 250 grams of chilli powder, 500 grams of tamarind and 100 grams of turmeric powder.

The Government of Telangana did away with supply of wheat atta, tur dal, palm oil, turmeric and chill powder through the FP shops.

According to cardholders Narsaiah of Secunderabad and Vimala of Musheerabad, the card-holders are not getting these commodities for the past two years.

Though Rs 2,134.49 lakh have been allocated to the Civil Supplies Department, supply of rations to the card-holders is stated to be inadequate.

The supply of sugar and kerosene is erratic. Some of the ration shops are not getting their supply. Hence FP shops were just limiting to sell subsidised rice alone, albeit per head sale of rice has been increased from 4 kg to 6 kg.

A ration dealer from Nalgonda said that the dealer gets a commission of 20 paise per kg. As there are no other commodities, the commission they earn by way of sale of the rice through the FP shops is wholly inadequate to run their families. The dealers earned handsomely when nine commodities were sold through the FP shops.

That is why the dealers are selling other commodities purchasing from the open market. Ration dealers’ state president Venkata Ramana blamed the government for reduction the number of commodities and suspect a ploy to do away with the FP shops gradually.

The poor have been facing difficulties with imposing of a cut in sugar and kerosene. According to a consumer, Jyoti from Addagutta and Anjaneyulu of Bacharam area of the city, they have been shelling down Rs 50 to purchase a litre of kerosene in the black market.

They accuse the FP dealers of weeding out their ration cards from circulation for their fault of demanding their right of sugar and kerosene.

Though the quota of rice to be supplied through the FP shops has been increased from 4 kg to 6 kg, the poor have been expressing their anguish at not getting other commodities, which were otherwise available in the past.

The 89-lakh odd white card-holders used to get these commodities through FP shops. The poor used to have two square meals a day at least to some extent.

The Opposition accuses the government of implementing an unofficial cut in the number of commodities as implementing the cut officially would make people hostile to the government.

The Civil Supplies Department’s website shows that the commodities are being supplied every month, but in practice it was not the case to be.

The Civil Supplies Department officials have refused to respond on the unofficial cut in the commodities.

Civil Supplies Department PRO Ramesh told The Hans India that only rice, sugar and kerosene are being supplied through the FP shops. When asked about the other commodities, he quipped that the question be better put to the elders in the government.

The poor are feeling that they are being deprived of their food security by imposing a cut in the essential commodities. Purchasing the commodities in the open market would put a heavy burden on the poor man with tur dal price sometimes touching Rs 150 a kg.

Small families used to be content with one kg of palm oil sold through the FP shops for whole month. Manemma of Warangal and Lakshmamma of Nalgonda expressed their inability to buy edible oil from open market spending hundreds of rupees.