Lok Sabha MP Neiphiu Rio on Wednesday asked officials of Food and Civil Supply department to provide quality food grain to the people saying, “food is a primary need of human being”.
Addressing a high level meeting of State Level Consultative Committee (SLCC) at Hotel Saramati, Rio who is also the chairman of the SLCC, said though scams after scams were reported in other states over distribution of food grains by FCI under Targetted Public Distribution System (TPDS) to the poor people, Nagaland government has however, been successful in implementing the centrally-sponsored scheme by providing “sufficient commodities” according to the demands of the people.
Rio also urged the FCI officials to bear the responsibility of receiving “sufficient quotas” of food grains from the Centre during “shortfalls” and said that the people of the state should not bear the brunt of the situation due “insufficient stock” during emergency situation.
Rio further pointed out the issue of Hill Transport Subsidy (HTS) faced by the state. MP also stressed for bumper production of food grains and other commodities in all the states of North East, including Nagaland so that the region would be self-sufficient in production of food grains to meet the growing demand.
A power point presentation was also made to highlight various activities undertaken by FCI in Nagaland.
With regard to Hills Transport Subsidies, where Nagaland failed to receive almost Rs. 12 crores, FCI officials clarified that the subsidy could not be released as it required fulfilling all criteria since the Ministry of Food & Civil Supplies was firm on this. FCI urged upon the state government to submit the said bills as per the criteria.
According to FCI, two godowns are under construction– one at Dimapur with 7500 MT capacity and the other at Phesama with 4950 MT capacity for storage of food grains to make up transit loses and quality distribution of the essential commodities.
The meeting was following by an interactive session where the SLCC prepared an agenda to ensure fair and judicious distribution of food grains to consumers under TPDS programme. The meeting stressed on the need of safety delivery of food grains from the FCI stores to state food and civil supply department store and safety arrival of food grains at district headquarters.
It was also decided that consignment of food grain would be checked at two points mainly at FCI delivery godown and at state godown in the district. The meeting made it clear that the depot manager(s) of FCI have to intimate the date and time of allocation of food grains to officials of district SLCC in prior to allocation. The meeting also directed that depot manager will have to issue food grains to state stockiest for the district in presence of SLCC officials.
Similarly, the same consignment of food grains sent out from FCI godown to district would be checked at the districts headquarters in the presence of DC or representatives, officials of supply department and FCI officers and SLCC. Distribution of items to consumers can be carried out only after checking in presence of representatives of tribal Hohos, NGOs and consumers.
The meeting also directed all DCs not to issue utilization certificates (UCs) for the food grains and covey notes (CB) in back date, without physically verifying the distribution.
It also cautioned that stern action would be taken against any person/agent found misusing food grains.
Similar checking will be carried out to all distribution lines of the food grains and other commodities allocated for implementation of various welfare schemes by various government departments.
The meeting of SLCC also resolved to open separate godown at Dimapur for storage of food grains and other essential commodities to make available supply during natural calamities and emergency situations. It urged upon the government of India to take steps for opening of special godown in Dimapur with 10,000 MT capacity to meet the crisis of commodities during emergency situation and natural calamities.
Further, it was also informed that the stock position of foodgrains in Nagaland as on October 10, 2015 was 20,560 Metric Tonnes (MT) of rice and 8221 MT of Indigenous wheat.
The items are being stored at various depots in Dimapur, Tuensang, Mokokchung and Mon districts.
On the number of ration card holders, Nagaland has a total of 115863 APL card holders; 77107 BPL card holders, 47786 AAY card holders and 6727 Annapurna cards.
Others who spoke on the occasion include, SLCCmembers, General Manager (Region), Anenla T Sato and additional secretary, Food & Civil Supplies, H Lungalang.