Ration card holders to get supplies across Kerala
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Finding it difficult to buy your ration quota after having moved away from home? Now you can make use of the ration card portability scheme, which is a component of the National Food Security Act (NFSA). You can get your rations from the shop in your new location using the old card until you manage to get a new one issued. According to the Food and Civil Supplies Department, nearly 40,000 people have so far made use of this provision which is particularly helpful to cardholders who have been transferred as part of their employment.
‘’Right now it is a need-based scheme where the cardholder can use the facility until he/she gets a new card issued in the new residential location after all the administrative delays. Technically, the provision is open to all,’’ Mini Antony, special secretary, Food and Civil Supplies, said. But the facility is not without its hitches, especially at a phase when full-fledged NFSA enforcement is in its initial phases. For instance, foodgrain availability. Not all the 14,374 ration retail shops stock foodgrain in equal amounts. Shop dealers are also yet to be fully comfortable with computerisation, which is key to the success of portability as the cardholder’s ration data can be accessed in any of the shops.
On the other hand, the government is planning a scheme where the stock allotment of ration foodgrain to the shops will be unified, as far as possible. The department recently completed all procedures related to NFSA enforcement including ration card renewal and doorstep delivery of ration foodgrain to the shops.
In the next phase, scheduled to begin soon, the department will begin issuing new cards to families newly formed after 2014.