BENGALURU: Minister for Food and Civil Supplies KH Muniyappa has said that the State Government is contemplating ordering a comprehensive probe into the misuse of Below Poverty Line (BPL) cards.Addressing the media here on Friday, Muniyappa said that the Anna Bhagya guarantee scheme was rolled out on July 10 and it was promised to give Rs 170 to each beneficiary due to non-availability of rice. He said Rs 566 crore has been transferred to one crore families under the Anna Bhagya scheme in a record time of 25 days. “Within 25 days, the government has deposited Rs 566 crore to the bank account of 1 crore beneficiary families, which benefits 3.50 crore people.
In the remaining 28 lakh families, 5,32,349 families have not received ration through PDS in the last three months, families with less than three members under the Antyodaya scheme are 3,40,425, and there are 19,27,226 families which don’t have a bank account or their accounts are not linked with Aadhaar number,” Muniyappa said.
On instances of misuse of BPL cards, the minister said there are several parameters to avail the benefits and it is found that many families who don’t require BPL cards are still availing the benefits.
“For instance, a family which has a personal car is not eligible to be considered below the poverty line, but if it owns a yellow-board car, it falls under the category. We are bringing in several changes to streamline the process like the addition of names of newborns and the deletion of names of those who have passed away. Once it is completed, we are contemplating ordering a comprehensive probe into misuse of BPL cards,” he said.
Further, he said that 2,95,986 applications to get new cards were pending and it has been instructed to issue the cards to eligible families within a month.
Further, Muniyappa said Karnataka was in talks with Andhra Pradesh and Telangana governments to procure the required rice to provide under Anna Bhagya. “We have conveyed to them that we are ready to buy rice if they don’t charge more than Rs 34. We are expecting their response within a week or two, and we intend to provide rice from next month,” he said.
Meanwhile, Muniyappa said also he has appealed to Union Minister Piyush Goyal to increase the minimum support price for ragi to Rs 5,000 and jowar to Rs 4,500 and the latter has responded positively.