KARWAR: Congress had made five pre-poll guarantees in their manifesto, which, abiding by their election assurance, were approved in the first meeting of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s cabinet. However, the granular details as to how these guarantees would be implemented are not clear.
The announcements before the elections and the eventual cabinet nod have led to an increase in demand for BPL cards, though already, 7,000 applications are pending before the Food and Civil Supplies department for the last couple of years.
Now, new applications are flooding the office as people want to be ready with the cards when the government comes up with the official outline of the guarantees.
“It has been more than two years since I applied for the card, but it is yet to be cleared,” said Ravi Das Naik, a beneficiary. The Food and Civil Supplies department has said it is pending inquiry. “We have been told by the officials that the government has not given the clearance for new cards,” said Naik.
People have been visiting their nearest Karnataka One and other service centres to submit online applications for the cards. “The government is yet to come out with any directive for the schemes. Once the government issues them, online applications will be opened,” said a department official.
In Uttara Kannada district, the department has received 15,170 BPL card applications and of them, 14,669 have been processed, while 501 have withdrawn. Of the processed applications, 5,901 have been considered, while 1,558 rejected. A total of 7,210 applications have been kept in abeyance due to server problems and other issues.
Manjunath Revankar, Deputy Director, Food and Civil Supplies Department, said that they are waiting for the government order to issue new cards. “We are only rectifying errors in ration cards and receiving applications for emergency health service benefits,” he said.