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Our Bureau

Bangalore, May 23 In a bid to eliminate bogus ration cards that cause a considerable drain on the State’s revenues, Karnataka has decided to introduce biometric cards that will monitor the distribution of food grains from the public distribution system to the designated beneficiaries.

The State incurs an annual expenditure of Rs 600-crore subsidy on PDS. The issue of biometric ration cards with a barcode will help in storing information regarding the head of each family and also his/ her thumb impression to help detect bogus cards and proper distribution of quota of foodgrains to the eligible BPL families.

An estimated 1 crore families would be issued the new cards by the Civil Supplies Department by the year-end. The process for issuing the cards has started in 150 taluks in the State. A private agency, entrusted to develop the card, has already captured photographs of 45 lakh families.

Cards would be issued to all below poverty and above poverty line families. The cost of each card is Rs 45 and it would be recovered from the households. However, the process has been slowed down in some taluks for a few days on account of posting the department officials to election duties, the official said.

Though the Centre had estimated only 32 lakh BPL families in Karnataka, the State had issued ration cards to 72 lakh families, which included above poverty line families. However, since APL families, which were included in the PDS, were not drawing food grains with their ration cards, the State bore the additional burden of subsidy by supplying the APL’s quota to the BPL consumers. It had fixed its own price of Rs 3 a kg for BPL against Rs 8 fixed by the Centre.

More Stories on : E-Governance | Karnataka

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