Thomas ready to counter attacks

Food minister hopeful of parrying questions at Cabinet meeting tomorrow; Oppn may not buy arguments.

Ahead of the crucial Union Cabinet meeting on food security Bill on Monday, food minister K V Thomas is prepared. He has armed himself with a point-by-point response to all the possible queries and objections that have been raised regarding the proposed legislation and remained unanswered in the last Cabinet meeting, which had eventually deferred a decision.

This also includes the oft-repeated queries on food subsidy, the enlarged numbers of beneficiaries and the government's control of grain trade.

The Food Bill is scheduled to be enacted and implemented from April 1, 2012.

In its response to the queries, the food ministry has estimated the additional recurring expenditure on running the programme, which includes a food subsidy component of Rs 27,700 crore annually, would be Rs 51,000 crore.

Of this, an expenditure of Rs 23,070 crore for providing meals to pregnant women, destitute, homeless etc would be shared between the central and state governments in accordance with the cost sharing norms for existing schemes.

Along with Rs 60,000 crore of food subsidy estimated for this financial year, the total amount could escalate to Rs 1,11,000 crore, including items cost, which would be shared with states to start the scheme.

The agriculture ministry, however, feels expenditure for running the programme will be higher as they would need to scale up their annual budget from Rs 20,000 crore at present to Rs 1,00,000, annually, to meet the requirements of additional grains.

Officials in the food ministry feel that subsidy estimates are dynamic as they are linked to changes in minimum support price (MSP) of crops, economic cost and central issue price (CIP) of grains.

Thomas, who held a series of meetings in the last few days, is believed to have explained his position and the fear of the government's takeover of grain trade.

Officials said the ministry believes the average annual procurement of wheat and rice in the last four years (2007-08 and 2010-2011) was 57 million tonnes, which is 32.1 per cent of the average annual production. So, if foodgrain production keeps on rising at a normal pace it won’t be difficult to procure the required quantities of grains, as already the procurement level is 30 per cent of the production.

On the objection raised by some civil society activists that coverage of population in priority category being low, the food ministry feels the proposed coverage of 46 per cent of rural population and 28 per cent of the urban population being in priority category is the minimum prescribed and could be altered once the current BPL (below poverty level) census comes up with higher numbers.

However, the opposition has already made it clear that states where it is in power should not be expected to pay for the pro-poor measures. “Bihar has still not implemented the Right to Education Act. Yes, it is a fundamental right and we are in violation of the constitution. But what can we do? We don’t have the money to create the infrastructure needed to provide universal education,” said Janata Dal United spokesperson Shivanand Tiwari. “It would be the same story with the Food Security Bill.”

So, will the favourite Bill of the UPA chairperson-headed National Advisory Council be cleared or will it see another deferment is anybody’s guess. Even, if the Bill is cleared and tabled in the current session of Parliament, will it draw support from the opposition will also be an important development to be watched over a period.