Ration card woes for Malda people

Statesman News Service

MALDA, Jan. 29: Tens of thousands of ration card applications are awaiting green signal from the authorities concerned in Malda district for the past one year, officials said today. After a meeting with the district officials, including the Malda district magistrate, the chairman of the Subject Committee for Food and Supplies, Mr Tarapada Chakraborti, said: "Nearly four lakh people do not have ration cards in Malda district." "Malda administration has issued only 69,000 ration cards. A total of 85,100 duplicate ration cards were issued last year and the department had cancelled 51,000 ration cards due to either death of the card holders or their transfer", Mr Chakraborti told reporters here today.Members of the Subject Committee came to Malda today to hold a meeting with the district officials to review activities of the four concerned departments. The chairman of the Committee, Mr Chakraborti, said Malda district magistrate would launch a special drive for three months in gram panchayat level to expedite the process of issuing ration cards. The district administration officials confessed before the Committee members that they could not issue the ration cards on time owing to lack of adequate staff in food and supplies department for verification of the applications following the government's special guideline for border districts. There is a hard and fast guideline for issuing ration cards to the people living along the Indo-Bangladesh border in order to check Bangladeshi people who can easily manage ration cards here and claim Indian citizenship. "Lack of adequate staff in the food and supplies department is hampering the execution of routine jobs," the Malda DM, Mr CR Das, said. "We have 53 sanctioned posts for sub inspectors in Malda food and supplies department but only 23 sub inspectors are working here these days. How could we expedite the process of issuing ration cards following government guidelines? ", Mr Das, questioned. On the other hand, it was also found that a few districts, such as Darjeeling in north Bengal and West Midnapore in south Bengal, had issued a large number of ration cards, more than the total population in those districts. "The Darjeeling district magistrate had to stop issuing ration cards in Hill areas after the detection of difference between the number of population and number of ration cards issued", Mr Chakraborti, said. At present, the people of Darjeeling Hills are in problem as they are not getting ration cards for their newborn members, he added. According to the report of the Subject Committee (based on the 2001 Census) the Darjeeling district administration had issued 18,65,557 ration cards, whereas its population was 16,05,900. Similarly, West Midnapore district had issued 56,62,152 ration cards though its population was 52,18,399 based on the 2001 Census. In Bankura, though the population was 31,91,830, a total of 33,53,656 ration cards were issued. A total of 18,65,557 ration cards were issued in Purulia, but its population was 16,05,900, Mr Chakraborti, said.