Bhubaneswar, Jan 30 (PTI) The Odisha government extended the deadline for e-KYC (know your customer) verification of ration cards to February 15, Food Supplies Minister Krushna Chandra Patra said on Thursday.

Speaking to reporters, Patra said the e-KYC verification of ration cards was supposed to end on January 31.

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"However, considering the requests of people, the government has decided to extend the deadline till February 15," he said.

The government's e-KYC process requires Aadhaar-based biometric authentication for each family member through e-POS machines. Each beneficiary of the public distribution system (PDS) will need to visit the nearest fair price shop for this.

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Earlier, the government had extended the deadline from December 31 to January 31.

A total of 3.26 crore people are beneficiaries of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) and 10.03 lakh people have been covered under the State Food Security Scheme (SFSS). More than 38 lakh of them have not completed their e-KYC verification process, officials 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)