BENGALURU: An assessment by the food and civil supplies department has thrown up some interesting data: at least 91,189 ration card holders did not belong to the BPL (below poverty line) strata, but were utilising government subsidies.
The department identified such cases and cancelled their ration cards (RCs). It was found that many such individuals, who were claiming subsidised ration, have over three hectares of land, or annual income higher than Rs 1.28 lakh. Some ration card holders are dead, others have political connections or a sound profession, but still hold a ration card and claim monthly subsidised ration.
The department is checking for more such cases. According to the latest report, a total of 91,189 RCs were cancelled, based on their income tax details. It was also found that 50,060 people have Antodaya Anna Yojana (AAY), Primary Household (PHH) cards, family income of above Rs 1.20 lakh, 85,204 are income-tax payers and 2,18,125 have land holdings of more than three hectares in rural areas.
BH Anil Kumar, additional chief secretary, food and civil supplies department, told TNIE that a total of 79,069 AAY RCs and PHH RCs have been cancelled based on income tax filing. The exercise has helped the department save the subsidy amount of Rs 5.01 crore per month, and Rs 60.20 crore annually.
“By synchronising income-tax filing data, the department has also been able to identify that of these 79,069 RCs holders, 4,893 are AAY card holders, and 74,176 PHH are RC holders. Also, based on income certificate shared by the revenue department, 12,120 RCs were cancelled, and based on registration of death data, we were able to weed out 4,01,307 ration card holders,” he said.
The criteria for data elimination is based on data of Aadhaar cards. Records of the Bhoomi database were also verified to identify ineligible beneficiaries. The food beneficiaries database is now being compared with beneficiary lists of various other departments, to remove inclusion errors in the food and civil supplies department’s database.
The department has not issued any ration cards for the past two years, and over one year of the pandemic, it has been utilised to eliminate illegal beneficiaries. Kumar said the data has been shared with the State and Central governments. The Centre has now sought a detailed report and asked other states to replicate the same model to find all those misusing the subsidy.
SIFTING THROUGH
1,48,89,430 Total ration card-holders in Karnataka
5,53,969 Ineligible RCs
3,37,920 New ration card applications received
1,86,092 Applications verified
57,423 Applications rejected