States and Union Territories have cancelled 4.39 crore ineligible, duplicate and fake ration cards since 2013, the Union government said on Tuesday.
In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Food and Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Narayan Jyoti said the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) under the National Food Security Act 2013 (NFSA) is operated with joint responsibilities for the central and State/UT governments.
The operational responsibilities for inclusion/exclusion of households/beneficiaries under the NFSA rests with the concerned State/UT government.
The minister said the addition and deletion of ration cards under TPDS is a continuous process.
States/UTs regularly review their list to identify and weed out ineligible ration cards and to include other left out and genuinely eligible households/beneficiaries under NFSA, up to their respective ceiling limits of population coverage under the Act, Jyoti said.
"Accordingly, and due to the use of technology in TPDS operations i.e. de-duplication due to digitisation of ration cards data, Aadhaar seeding, detection of ineligible, duplicate, bogus ration cards, migration, death of beneficiaries, etc. the States/UTs have deleted a total of about 4.39 crore ineligible, duplicate and fake ration cards during the years 2013 to 2020 so far," the minister said.
Jyoti also said the States/UTs have been advised to undertake proper verification to ensure that ration cards of genuine beneficiaries are not deleted or suspended.
