FRESH ORDER PLACED TO IRON OUT GAPS IN FREE FOOD GRAINS SCHEME IN DELHI

The Delhi government has placed fresh orders to procure 5,000 metric tonnes (MT) of wheat and rice to ensure no more hiccups in its scheme to provide free food grains to people without ration cards in the city, senior officials said on Saturday.

“The demand was clearly way more than what was expected. But people should not panic. Delhi government will provide free ration to every deserving person... We have placed orders with the Food Corporation of India for more food grains, which will arrive soon,” said Imran Hussain, Delhi food and civil supplies minister.

Over the past two weeks, beneficiaries faced a lot of problems with the distribution centres running out of food grains due to huge demand.

On Saturday, Hussain said the government has “taken note of all the grievances”. “We assure you that things will be further streamlined in the coming days to make the entire process hassle-free,” he said.

On May 18, Kejriwal announced that people without ration cards too will get free food grains, pegging the number of beneficiaries at 2 million over and above those covered under the public distribution system. Under the scheme, which was implemented on June 5, each beneficiary gets 4kg wheat and 1kg rice.

Department reports showed that from June 5 till Saturday afternoon, the Delhi government distributed 5,000MT of food grains to 450,000 beneficiaries through 280 centres set up in government schools in each ward.

Himanshu Bisht, a resident of East Vinod Nagar who got his package of ration on Saturday, said the system does not require prior registration. “I just had to show my Aadhaar card and got 5kg of free ration. A lot of us have had to face pay cuts and have even lost our jobs. This scheme has proved to be extremely helpful,” he said.

Officials said even those without a mobile phone are being given free ration.