NEW DELHI, SEPT 26: After the proverbial rats that are supposed to be eating up huge stocks of foodgrains stored for the poor in the godowns of the Food Corporation of India, this is probably the biggest scam to hit the government's Public Distribution System.According to the mid-term review of the Ninth Five Year Plan, to be finalised on Saturday, a whopping 36 per cent of the wheat distributed through the country's ration shops does not reach those whom it is meant for. Diversion of rice is as high as 31 per cent, and 23 per cent of the total sugar distributed through the PDS doesn't reach the intended beneficiaries either.How much does all this add up to? Given the fact that the food subsidy on the PDS was a whopping Rs 9,200 crore, the loss from diversions adds to anywhere around Rs 3,000 crore.Nor is the Targeted PDS (TPDS), meant for the very poor districts of the country, faring better. According to the mid-term review, the `TPDS does not seem to be working in the poorest North and North Eastern States.'Further, while the TPDS allocations for the poorer states like Bihar, UP and Assam has more than doubled, the scheme has made no impact on the nutrition levels of the state since there has been very little lifting of BPL grain, that is grain allocated for those who are Below the Poverty Line. (Research by Kriesel and Zaidi in Uttar Pradesh had found, for instance, that just 40 per cent of TPDS grain reached the intended beneficiaries.)A related problem, according to the review, is that the poor do not have the funds to buy the 20 kg of grain allocated to them - and officials usually charge the poor around 14 per cent extra for the grain meant for them.The losses to the national exchequer apart, as a result of the huge diversion, the mid-term review states that the availability of foodgrains has also fallen. Though foodgrain production rose from 175 million tonne to 206 million in the '90s, the growth rate in availability has fallen 0.3 per cent in the '90s as against a growth of 1.2 per cent in the '80s - the food consumption of the poor has gone down in the 90s.Eventually, the mid-term review's suggestion is that ways be found to reduce the PDS stocks to around half the current level, and still be able to meet the needs of the poor.
