Is India's cheap food programme making the poor spend less on food?

The implementation of National Food Security Act has halved the monthly food grain expenses of 75 per cent of India's rural population

It was billed as Sonia Gandhi’s pet legislation. As it turned out, the onus was on the Modi government to execute it. The National Food Security Act (NFSA) was passed in 2013, a few months before the Congress-led UPA-2 government was voted out of power. The legislation that provided 75 per cent of India’s rural population and half its urban population with rice, wheat and coarse cereals at heavily subsidised rates of Rs 3, Rs 2 and Re 1, respectively, took a long time to fructify even after the legislation was enacted. It wasn’t until the latter half of 2016