Congress flays U.P. govt for revised ration card criteria. How can onus be on poor people and not on officials, it asks

The Congress on Saturday attacked the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh for revising the eligibility criteria to have ration cards.

The party said that while the BJP bragged about the free ration scheme during the election, it was snatching food from the poor on returning to power.

At a press conference in Delhi, party spokesperson Supriya Shrinate said that the “free ration scheme” was waved in the face of every question on inflation, state of the economy, and high unemployment rate.

She said the Uttar Pradesh government, through the district magistrates, had issued orders saying that people who own even a motorcycle, run a poultry business or dairy, have any piece of land or even a roof over their heads were no longer eligible to hold ration cards. They have been asked to return the ration card and in case they don’t, the market cost of the foodgrains given to them will be retrospectively collected from them.

‘Penalising the poor’

Ms. Shrinate asked, “The one question that comes to my mind is during the middle of a pandemic even if someone had a motorcycle but had lost their jobs and had no income, how did the government expect them to be fed?” It is equally surprising that the onus is being put on the ration card holders rather than the officials who issued them.

“Let us for a minute assume that ration cards were given to some people who do not qualify for it, but who gave these ration cards? Were they not given by officials of the Uttar Pradesh government and should they not be held accountable before penalising the poor people for allegedly faulty ration cards?” the party spokesperson said.

The 2013 Food Security Act lays down the percentage of people to be legally covered by food security in each State. In Uttar Pradesh, 79.5% of the people in rural areas and 64.4% in urban areas stand to benefit from the Food Security Act.

The April 2022 food grain bulletin released by the Government of India states that 15.2 crore people in Uttar Pradesh should be beneficiaries of the Act.

https://epaper.thehindu.com/Home/MShareArticle?OrgId=GDM9RD35K.1&imageview=0