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Journalism of Courage
Ration shop dealers in the state, on the receiving end for more than a month now, resorted to a statewide agitation on Monday with nearly 5,700 dealers surrendering their licences. The dealers described this as a protest against Government’s failure to ensure safety and security to them whose outlets and homes have been attacked, looted and in many places set on fire.
There are about 20,370 licensed ration dealers in the state as part of the public distribution chain. “Everyone would surrender if the demands placed before the Chief Minister are not met. Ration shops in many areas in the state were closed on Monday, but wherever they are open, ration dealers have already started resigning,” said secretary of the All-India Fair Price Shop Dealers’ Association Biswambhar Basu.
The state Government, meanwhile, has initiated damage control measures and is going to bring in some new policies to ensure transparency in the PDS system.
“We will soon make it mandatory for a gram sabhapati to inform the Food and Supplies department on the death of a ration card holder so that his or her card can be cancelled with immediate effect. Also, if any card is not used for four weeks at a stretch, it would be cancelled,” said Food and Supplies Minister Paresh Chandra Adhikary. Manual inspection of PDS outlets would also be made mandatory, he added.
“We are being targeted for the existence of fake or invalid ration cards. But we are not in-charge of issuing cards, so we should not be blamed for it. The Government has to stop conducting random raids on ration dealers without any allegations against them. They are just doing this to show that they have suspended many dealers and fulfilled their duty,” said Basu.
A spokesman said the ration dealers had raised the issue several times on earlier occasions with department officials concerned, but got no response. Adhikary admitted that the unfair use of ration cards was not something that the ration dealers could check.
The decision to surrender licences had been taken and communicated to the Government as early as on October 8, but in view of the ensuing festive season and owing to requests by Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacherjee and Left Front chairman Biman Bose, the move was deferred. In order to mitigate the crisis, ration dealers in the state are meeting the CM and Adhikary on Tuesday.
