Hyderabad: Telangana civil supplies minister N Uttam Kumar Reddy announced that fine grain rice would distributed to ration card holders across the state starting April 1. The scheme will be officially launched by chief minister A Revanth Reddy from Huzurnagar at a public meeting, which will be held on the occasion of the Ugadi festival at 5 pm on March 30.
Addressing media persons in Hyderabad on Friday, March 28, Reddy said that 80 to 84 percent of the population of Telangana will receive 6 kg fine grain rice per beneficiary in a ration card.
He termed it the first-of-its-kind scheme in the country, he said that it is one of such few schemes which will touch the lives of every citizen living below the poverty line.
Currently, 2.84 crore beneficiaries covered under around 90 lakh ration cards will start availing free fine-grain rice starting April 1.
The state government is set to distribute 30 lakh new ration cards, enabling beneficiaries to receive fine-grain rice once approved. With the addition of these new cards, the total number of ration cards in the state will reach approximately 1 crore, benefiting a population of 3.1 crore.
The fine grain rice scheme has a total outlay of Rs 13,523 crore, with Rs 5,480 crore contributed by the Centre and Rs 8,033 crore borne by the state government. Additionally, the upgraded scheme will impose an extra financial burden of Rs 2,800 crore on the state.
“We have recently met Union minister for food and public distribution, Prahlad Joshi, and requested the Centre to bear the additional cost under the PM Gareeb Kalyan Yojana. He assured us that the Centre would certainly consider it,” said Reddy.
The upgraded scheme will require approximately 27 to 28 lakh tonnes of fine grain rice to be distributed among the poor.
Dismissing claims by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leaders that their government issued lakhs of new ration cards during its tenure, Reddy said that in 2014, the total number of ration cards stood at 89,73,708. While some cards were added and others deleted over the years, the net increase during BRS’s decade-long rule was only 49,479 ration cards.
