The State government’s decision to modify its populist 30 kg rice scheme for Rs 1 per kg is a setback to the fledgling Congress government.
The modification has come within 24 hours of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah reiterating his commitment to the Legislative Assembly that this scheme will be launched from July 1.
“After that forceful speech where he spoke of uplifting the poor, he has made this U-turn. He is definitely going to fall down flat on his face trying to implement this scheme, because it is flawed. They may raise the money, but they will not be able to source the rice. This scheme basically helps the fair price shop dealers to make a lot of money in the black market, rather than help the poor,” Legislative Assembly Opposition leader H D Kumaraswamy told Express.
Siddaramaiah announced this programme within hours of taking oath as the Chief Minister. He had stated that the scheme will be launched from June 1. He had also announced that the unit system introduced by the BJP government was scrapped and all cardholder families would receive 30 kg rice.
The scheme had to be put off to July 1 as the state did not have either the required rice stock or the huge financial outlay to implement the scheme. The scheme is estimated to cost `4,600 crore, as a lot of the rice has to be sourced from open market. Till date, resources have not been mobilised. This has led to heated discussions in the Cabinet meeting.
A source told Express: “Some ministers and also MLAs felt the new scheme will swell the number of ration cards and lead to further burden on the State resources. In the Cabinet meeting, ministers felt that though the rice scheme was announced in the Congress manifesto, the CMshould have gone slow as it involves huge subsidies.” Senior ministers reportedly pointed out logistic difficulties in sourcing food grains and suggested modification by introducing slabs (with inputs from Sowmya Aji).