Pds Needs New Approach
These findings all provide a firm empirical basis for what was already known intuitively, that the PDS needs to be overhauled completely. The studies say there are wide variations in urban/rural and inter-state coverages. While less than 40 per cent of the rural population uses the PDS on an all-India basis, the figure is less than 10 per cent in poor states like Bihar, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh. This means that most of the poor have to meet their food requirements from the open market, where prices can often be unaffordable. It also emerges that the extent of PDS usage is more for kerosene and sugar. This suggests a clear pro-urban and pro-rich bias in the system, although this problem is less in southern states like Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, where it is better targeted. There is also the problem of leakages in the delivery system. About 20 per cent of what is spent on the PDS reaches the poor.
There is, however, little agreement on how best to overhaul the PDS. One idea is to channelise only coarse grains through the system. However, apart from consumption preferences which may divert coarse grains from human to bovine consumption, the FCI does not have enough coarse grains to make this workable. Second is the idea of food stamps which will do away with the PDS and the FCI altogether. This idea needs in-depth examination. Third, there could be area-based targeting as in the revamped public distribution system (RPDS). But preliminary evidence shows that there are leakages here as well, even though the RPDS, at present, only exists in backward blocks. Fourth, there could be means-based targeting, which is what the present government wants. But for this to work, the PDS needs to be restricted only to the poor. Otherwise, the white ration card system in Andhra Pradesh illustrates what is likely to happen 70 per cent of households in Andhra Pradesh have managed to acquire white cards.
The most sensible suggestion is of linking the PDS with employment generation programmes, such as the Employment Guarantee Scheme (EGS) in Maharashtra, which have an inbuilt element of self-targeting. Consequently, although leakages exist, the transfer efficiency of the EGS is more. Given the wages offered under employment schemes, the not-so poor exclude themselves voluntarily. However, the first task is for the country to accept that schemes like the PDS are meant for the poor and not for the not-so-poor.