India News | Centre Asks State Food Commissions to Give Special Attention to Vulnerable Sections

New Delhi, Dec 4 (PTI) The Centre on Friday asked state food commissions (SFCs) to give special attention to vulnerable section of the society while ensuring effective implementation of food law.

A review meeting was held with independent SFCs under the chairmanship of Food Secretary Sudhanshu Pandey to share the experience of the SFCs and to take note of the problems being faced by them towards the discharge of responsibilities mandated under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), according to an official statement.

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With the implementation of the food law, the food secretary said, there has been a paradigm shift from welfare-based approach to providing foodgrains to the beneficiaries as a legal entitlement.

Although a lot of progress has been made since the enactment of the food law, a lot of ground is still to be covered, he added.

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Under the food law, the central government provides 5 kg of foodgrains per person per month at Rs 2-3 per kg to over 80 crore population.

He told the SFCs that concurrent evaluation of public distribution system (PDS) was being conducted by institutes of repute, the link for which would be shared with SFCs for information.

In a functioning democracy, an effective public grievance redressal system is a must, he said.

The secretary emphasised that the SFCs need to give specific consideration to vulnerable persons like persons with disability (PwDs), persons without shelter, sanitation workers and rag pickers.

Presentations were made on their functioning by SFCs of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand.

In its presentation, SFC Jharkhand mentioned that the responsibility of appointment of members and staff rests totally with the state government which restricts their independence. It also expressed the problem of lack of proper infrastructure to facilitate smooth functioning.

Thereafter, SFCs of Telangana, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Punjab, Tripura, Kerala, Uttarakhand and Tamil Nadu also raised specific issues.

Some of the key issues raised by SFCs were: Putting in place of independent DGRO; convergence between departments; adequate budget, infrastructure and staff for SFCs; direct funding for one-time financial assistance to SFCs; single toll-free number for complaints; focus on awareness generation; rationalisation of fair price shops.

In his concluding remarks, the secretary asked whether SFCs were giving special attention to aspirational districts where development parameters were below normal.

He further asked about SFCs' plan for special targeting of the vulnerable sections under PDS.

The secretary informed SFCs that the central government is open to the idea of providing financial assistance to the SFCs for awareness generation.

He advised the SFCs to inform the central government about the legal, financial and administrative difficulties being faced by them in discharging of their duties.

During the meeting, it was emphasised that SFCs have an important role in having a strong oversight on the implementation of PDS to ensure that poor, vulnerable and weaker sections of society are given highly subsidised ration in time and in full quantiy.

State governments are urged to strengthen the SFCs to serve the people of the states better, the statement said.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)