PLUGGING THE LEAKSIMPROVING REACH AND EFFICIENCY OF THE

PUBLIC DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM

Team MembersDeepanker Koul (Team Co-ordinator)

Soumyadeep Dutta

Yadvender Singh

Anurag Gautam

Saurabh Vishnoi

What is PDS?The Public Distribution System in India is an important

public intervention for enhancing food security. The PDS

provides subsidised food grains (other essential commodities)

through a network of “Fair Price Shops”. It is responsible for

the distribution of food grains/stocks procured by FCI at a

subsidised price to the deprived sections of the society. The

Public Distribution System of India is the largest network of

its kind in the world providing food to millions of deprived

people in India through a large chain of Fair Price Shops (or

simply the “Ration shops”). With over 4.3 lakh Fair Price

Shops, the Public Distribution System on one hand garners

great hopes of providing subsidised food to millions of

underprivileged Indians, it also poses an enormous challenge

to the policy makers with the huge sums of money involved

in various scams and inefficiencies of PDS systems.

PDS – The Troubled Guy

Adulteration INSUFFICIENT PDS OUTLETS

Lack of Proper Storage Facility

Black Marketing

Lack of Quality Control

FpS owner’S Commission

Problems Unresolved

Non-Following of Prescribed

Norms

Highly Inefficiency

Lack of Proper Awareness

Failure to Provide Proper

Nutrition

These Problems Lead to

Widespread malnutrition due lack of proper nutritious food

Lack of Proper Storage facility leads to tonnes of precious food grains being wasted.

Inefficiency of system leads to wastage of taxpayers money in form of misused subsidies.

Lack of proper commission to FPS owners forces them to resort to malpractices.

Lack of awareness of peoples’ rights leads to their abuse and rampant corruption.

Black Marketing of the food grains meant for Public Distribution leads to false scarcity of grains which then further leads to Pseudo-Inflation.

Lack of proper accountability has lead to people’s voices falling on deaf ears.

And the worse of all, people sleeping empty stomach even though food for all is available in the country.

SOME OF THE QUICK FIXES AVAILABLE

NOW CAN BE

Strictly following the guidelines laid by Commission for Agricultural Costs & Pricing(CACP) for Minimum Support Prices(MSP) so as to tackle the large influx of food grains into FCI storehouse thereby effectively tackling inflation created by Govt!

FCI should procure only a fixed predetermined amount of grains for distribution as well as buffer stocks and allow rest to be sold in open market, thereby reducing chances of a self created scarcity of grains in open market.

Food Grains stored by FCI should be distributed in stipulated amount of time and expiry date for the consumption of food grains should be indicated so as to ensure distribution of quality grains.

Use of Bar Coded Food Stamp/Credit Cards linked with Aadhar Cards by respective Govts should be encouraged in place of the older ration cards so as to effectively weed out fake beneficiaries of various Govt. schemes.

Include vegetables and milk in PDS system to effectively tackle Malnutrition.(Such a provision can be made with the help of Food Security Bill so as to increase its effectiveness.)

LONG TERM SOLUTIONS

One of the long term solution for curing the ailing PDS system can be privatizing it on the lines of Public Private Partnership(or PPP) model. Under this model the Fixed Price Shops can be leased out to private firms experienced in running a chain of food outlets/departmental stores so that the PDS can be revamped on modern lines. This can improve the efficiency as well as weed out rampant corruption present in the PDS system.

Using technology for making the system more lucid and transparent. Instead of issuing “Ration” simply on the basis of number of people in a family “Ration”

should be issued according to the nutritional needs of the people after collecting proper data.

There should be an option of food to be issued at a number of shops/counters instead of just one to increase competition.

Fair Price Shops (FPS) should be allowed to sell commodities other than regular ration (Rice, Wheat etc) so as to make some profit out of it. This can help to reduce the burden of subsidy on the exchequer

A part of money paid in Govt employment schemes such as MGNREGA in terms of food credit coupons which can be later redeemed at Fair Price Shops.

Although the number of fair price shops in India is a staggering 4.3 lakhs it is still insufficient compared to bulk of population it has to cater. Thus it is important to open/lease out more FPS so as to cater the growing need of an ever-growing population.

The ownership of FPS should be given to people living nearby or a community organisation like Gram panchayat etc. to make it more accountable

Strictly following MSP norms can help Govt to curb inflation a bit. Also it can help in preventing the rapid change in the cropping

patter as experienced in the recent times(leading to a lot of other problems on their own).

Keeping only an apt amount of buffer stocks can help in keeping the open market more dynamic and hence the scarcity of food materials

as experienced can be curbed.

Using technology for identifying beneficiaries as well as in the day to day working of the Public Distribution System can help

in weeding out fake consumers and also help to keep the system going smoothly. Also a number of malpractices of FPS

owners can be curbed, thus helping people get what they deserve - Pure Nutritious Food.

Using Bar Coded bags/containers while transferring food grains can help in preventing black marketing and other malpractices

rampant in the trade.

IMPACT OF STEPS PROPOSED

BETTER PDS BETTER INDIA

References

Tenth Five Year Plan, Planning Commission

Eleventh Five Year Plan, Planning Commission

„PDS System in India‟ Wikipedia article

Articles from various newspaper and monthly

magazines.

Justice Wadhwa PDS Report (GUJARAT), 2007

Chhattisgarh Food Security Bill, 2007

PDS in India, APCR Karnataka

APPENDIX