Bihar asked to follow TN to provide foodgrain for free

Union Food and Consumer Affairs Minister Ramvilas Paswan today urged the Nitish Kumar government to take cue from Tamil Nadu and some other states in supplying free of cost foodgrains to the beneficiaries.
"Tamil Nadu and some other states are bearing the consumers' burden of Rs 2 and Rs 3 per kg respectively on purchase of subsidized wheat and price to make foodgrain under the National Food Security Act entirely free of cost for the beneficiaries....The Bihar government too should follow the measure to make foodgrains available to beneficiaries entirely free of cost," Paswan told reporters.
Paswan claimed that the Bihar government does not pay a penny towards delivery of foodgrains to beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act as they pay Rs 2 and Rs 3 on purchase of wheat and rice respectively while the Centre bears the remaining cost at Rs 18 for per kg wheat and Rs 27 for per kg rice respectively.

The Union Food and Consumer Affairs also sought to run over the state government's claim over success of poverty alleviation programme in Bihar saying that the number of beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act increased by Rs 97 lakh at 8.57 crore this year against Rs 7.60 crore in May 2014.
For 8.57 crore food beneficiaries, the Centre allocates 1.83 lakh metric tonne wheat and 2.74 lakh metric tonne rice per month which the Bihar government has been lifting on monthly basis, Paswan said adding state government has lifted 94 per cent foodgrain allocated for March.
Despite the Centre providing foodgrains for distribution to the people, a lot of complaints were being heard from the beneficiaries, the Union Minister alleged adding that his department has issued a control order for end-to-end computerization and constitution of monitoring committee at panchayat level to usher in transparency in distribution of food quota to the beneficiaries.

A central committee will visit Bihar to ascertain if the state government was abiding by the control order or not, he said.