World Bank estimates of extreme poverty in 2010 were that over 32.7% of the Indian population lived on less than $1.25 a day, down from more than 50% in 1994. According to World Bank report 2016, 1 out of 5 people living in India is poor. Poverty rate in urban area is 14% while poverty rate in rural area is 25%. In rural area low income categories are mainly casual labor while in urban area low income categories are mainly self employed and casual labor or daily wagers.

Data and Facts related to SDG-2

  • According to FAO estimates in ‘The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World, 2017” report, 190.7 million people are undernourished in India.
  • By this measure 14.5% of the population is undernourished in India.
  • Also, 51.4% of women in reproductive age between 15 to 49 years are anaemic.
  • Further according to the report 38.4% of the children aged fewer than five in India are stunted (too short for their age), while 21% suffer from wasting, meaning their weight is too low for their height. Malnourished children have a higher risk of death from common childhood illnesses such as diarrhea, pneumonia, and malaria.
  • The Global Hunger Index 2016 ranks India at 97 out of 118 countries on the basis of three leading indicators — prevalence of wasting and stunting in children under 5 years, under 5 child mortality rate, and the proportion of undernourished in the population.

Executive summary

World Bank estimates of extreme poverty in 2010 were that over 32.7% of the Indian population lived on less than $1.25 a day, down from more than 50% in 1994. According to World Bank report 2016, 1 out of 5 people living in India is poor. Poverty rate in urban area is 14% while poverty rate in rural area is 25%. In rural area low income categories are mainly casual labor while in urban area low income categories are mainly self employed and casual labor or daily wagers. The data shows that Poor and Non-Poor both of the categories spent maximum proportion of their income in food. Furthermore, the Poor spent 56% of their income in food while the Non-Poor spent 47% of their income in food. This numbers clearly depicts that the Poor spends more on food than Non-Poor. Subsidies given on food by the government for the poor can save some portion of their income which they can spend in health, education or others. Though India has the largest consumer market but even than middle class and poor class population doesn’t have any disposable income. They consume all their income that is the leading cause of decline in average propensity to save, which directly impact on our economy. The inter-relationships between poverty and nutrition are well known; poverty restricts access to food required to meet daily requirements or ensure dietary diversity and thus leads to malnutrition, while malnutrition can adversely affect educational and economic attainments, thus perpetuating poverty. Therefore, in the existing scenario of unequal growth and poverty, it is not surprising that the burden of malnutrition in India remains high; there is therefore no surprising paradox in the coexistence of relatively high aggregated growth rates and high rates of malnutrition. According to UNICEF nutrition report, over a third of the world’s poor live in India, as do over a third of the world’s malnourished children; 43 and 48 % of less than 5 years are underweight or stunted due to chronic under nutrition. Chinnakali. P. (2014) has found that around half of the monthly income was spent on purchasing food and, even then, there was a high prevalence of food insecurity. It might be due to the large family-size where the amount spent on food would have been insufficient to meet the food requirements of all the family members. He further mentioned that the Government needs to supplement the provision of food security (through a universal or targeted approach) with a mix of short- and long-term policies.

History about the scheme

To mitigate the problem of food insecurity the first initiative was taken in India during the Second World War, when the Bengal famine occurred. In the backdrop of Bengal famine, PDS evolved in 1950s to 60s which further supported both the producers and consumers by improving purchasing price of agricultural products which was beneficial for the farmers and agricultural labors and subsidizing the price of food grains for consumers. The objective of PDS was- 1. To provide food grains on regular basis in affordable price to weaker section of the society. 2. To work as an effective anti-inflationary measure. 3. To improve the nutrition intake among Indian Poor. PDS was acting magnificent in achieving food security and poverty alleviation mission of India. But it failed to benefit the diverse geographical population therefore in 1992 PDS was replaced with Revamped Public Distribution System was started to provide relief to the poor people of desert, hilly, drought prone and Adivasi areas in India. Later on, In 1997 TPDS was introduced aiming at providing food grains to people below the poverty line at highly subsidized prices from the PDS and food grains to people above the poverty line at much higher prices than the poverty line Thus, the TPDS adopted by the Government of India maintains the universal character of the PDS but adds a special focus on the people below the poverty line (known as BPL). TPDS aims at providing food grains to people below the poverty line at highly subsidized prices from the PDS and food grains to people above the poverty line at much higher prices than the poverty line Thus, the TPDS adopted by the Government of India maintains the universal character of the PDS but adds a special focus on the people below the poverty line (known as BPL).Varadharajan. K.S. (2013) found that in the post-economic reform era, it was revamped as the targeted PDS (TPDS) in 1997 to benefit households below the poverty line. The utilization of PDS has increased from 24.4% in 2004-05 to 39.1% in 2009- 10 in rural areas, while in urban areas it increased from 13.1% to 20.5%. The share of PDS to total food grain consumption also seems to have increased;63 however, estimates based on NSSO 2009-10 data reveal that only 41% of PDS grain actually reached beneficiaries. This further explains that TPDS system is actually addressing food insecurity issues.

Problem statement

Food is one of the major components of our basic needs and due to income disparity food availability and distribution is uneven within the income groups. To reduce food insecurity among low income group population in India, government has introduced TPDS scheme.

Scheme Detailing

Eligibility Group

• The most distinctive feature of the TPDS in relation to the previous policy is the introduction of targeting by dividing the entire population into Below Poverty Line (BPL) and Above Poverty Line (APL) categories, based on the poverty line defined by the Planning Commission. The maximum income level for the population to be covered under BPL was kept at Rs. 15,000 per annum. The TDPS provides wheat at Rs. 2/kg., rice Rs. 3/kg and millets at the Rs. 1/kg to the BPL families.

• The AAY scheme was launched in December 2000 for the poorest among the BPL families.5 Individuals in the following priority groups are entitled to an AAY card, including: (i) landless agricultural labor (ii) marginal farmers, (iii) rural artisans/craftsmen such as potters and tanners, (iv) slum dwellers, (v) persons earning their livelihood on a daily basis in the informal sector such as porters, rickshaw pullers, cobblers, (vi) destitute, (vii) households headed by widows or terminally ill 4 persons, disabled persons, persons aged 60 years or more with no assured means of subsistence, and (viii) all primitive tribal households.

Roles and responsibility

• Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) is operated under the joint responsibility of the Central and the State/Union Territory (UT) Governments.

• Central Government is responsible for procurement, allocation and transportation of food grains up to the designated depots of the Food Corporation of India

• The operational responsibilities for allocation and distribution of food grains within the States/UTs, identification of eligible beneficiaries, issuance of ration cards to them and supervision over and monitoring of functioning of Fair Price Shops (FPSs) rest with the concerned State/UT Governments.

• State/UT Governments have been requested from time to time to carry out drives for reviewing the list of beneficiaries under TPDS. The exercise of deletion of bogus/ineligible cards and inclusion of eligible families is a continuous process and State/UT Governments are to periodically carry out the same.

Financial implementation

The cost sharing between centre and States would be on 90:10 for North-Eastern States, whereas for other States/UTs, cost will be shared on 50:50.

Implementation

• The States & UTs may engage a common agency for implementation of activities, namely,

(a) supply and installation of IT Infrastructure required for – application software / CAS, State F&CS offices & storage godowns;

(b) Training to F&CS staff;

(c) Technical manpower;

(d) Field level maintenance support during the project term,

(e) Creation of State PDS portal as per standards and linking the same with National PDS Portal, etc.

• For smoother functioning of the Computerized system, State F&CS officials / staff at various levels and FPS dealers are to be imparted training on the use of technology and day to day operations. This shall be one time activity and to be planned keeping in mind the needs of the State F&CS officers / FPS dealers.

• For State Godowns, Desktops / laptop has been provisioned for data entry, online stock reporting, movement and transportations of food grains along with accessories for smoother functioning of day to day operations. Bandwidth/ connectivity cost has also been provisioned in this head.

• Empowered Committee headed by Secretary (F&PD) – roles and responsibilities

a. Decisions on policy matters

b. Overall guidance, review, coordination and monitoring of computerization of TPDS

c. Finalize deliverables and timelines relating to TPDS computerization

d. Quarterly meeting to review & monitor in order to ensure timely and quality implementation

e. Appraise/ approve recommendations of Finance & Technical Committees

f. Review and appraise the performance of MMP of DoF&PD, Technical Partner (NIC at Central level) and State level Mission Teams/Technical Partner (NIC or other agencies)

g. Review & appraise Special Pilot Projects (Smart Cards, etc.)

h. Review & appraise Computerization of FCI operations at Godowns

i. Any other issue as may be taken up by EC

• Finance Committee (FC)

a. Recommend proposals after scrutiny for financial assistance received from States/UTs and NIC under the scheme and put up to Competent Authority for approval;

b. Assess periodically the progress made by States/UTs and NIC as per milestones and timelines; Recommend release of further installments, recoveries if required, etc.

c. Assess fund requirements for Component-II.

d. Recommend policy / process related reforms / changes to EC

e. Any other issue as may be assigned by the Empowered Committee.

• Technical Committee (TC)

a. Prepare Technology Roadmap for TPDS computerization including special pilot projects and integration with FCI Godown computerization scheme.

b. Provide a dedicated National Data Center for TPDS and its linkage with State Data Centers.

c. Provide technical guidance and advisories to DoF&PD, States/UTs, and NIC technical team for implementation of the scheme

d. Address technical issues for integration of CAS with (i) existing PDS solutions; (ii) non-CAS based solutions in States/UTs; and (iii) other Government scheme

e. Monitor the functioning of NIC technical team

f. Evaluation and Finalization of specifications, standards, etc. of hardware and software required for implementing Component-I and Component-II

g. Assessing & augmenting capacity building needs of NIC

h. Any other issue as may be assigned by the Empowered Committee.

• MMP Team at DoF&PD

a. Overall responsibility for design and development of Component I & II of the scheme

b. Examine all technical parameters & standards incl. those relating to architecture, network, data storage, connectivity, hardware, software etc. at Centre & State/UT level; ensure they are in line with the best practices and in synergy with existing initiatives of Central and State/UT Governments.

c. Ensure integration of various stakeholders such as DoF&PD, FCI, States/UTs, Aadhaar/NPR, etc. and inter-operability across platforms

d. Assess readiness of common application and State/UT application software modules, their effectiveness as per scheme requirement.

e. Review application software customization in States/UTs, define user acceptance norms and confirm user acceptance

f. Identify human resource requirements; recommend appropriate qualifications, sourcing norms, etc.

g. Identify training requirements; define training programmers of NIC, training calendars, sourcing of trainers, etc.

h. Assess the proposals received from States/UTs under the scheme as per administrative approval, guidelines issued etc. on the financial and technical angle; decide upon admissibility, deviations permissible, etc.; obtain administrative approvals and financial sanctions from competent authority

i. Review the scheme progress on weekly basis; track its progress in States/UTs against milestones incl. through MIS tools; take requisite measures to resolve issues affecting scheme implementation

j. Any other issue as may be assigned by the Empowered Committee.

Policy Alternative

Food subsidies are useful to balance various needs of the all income group population. As the population can minimize their opportunity cost and can utilize that amount in purchasing other goods and services like as minimizing the food expenditure will help in increasing the proportion of income spend in education, health, fuel, etc. The access of the policy is limited to the population holding Ration card. According to Banerjee (2012), In Delhi the availability of ration card is only 37% among bottom wealth quintile. Which clearly explains that maximum of the poor household is deprived of the schemes. To make the scheme accessible to the needful population to address the problem of food insecurity there is a need to educate the low income population about the schemes. The literacy rate among bottom wealth quintile is low; therefore, they are unaware about the application procedure of ration card. To address this issues and for impactful implementation of the scheme in urban slum of Delhi we will be using SMAART application platform which will act as a bridge model to educate and aware the population about the schemes and its application in simplest form.

Policy Recommendation

This is a brief summery about Targeted Public Distribution System, which throws a limelight on the detailing about the scheme. The objective of the study is to highlight the key components of the schemes in simplest language which will benefit the general public in understanding the overview of the scheme. The brief about the scheme has been mentioned in many websites wherein the information has been manipulated and transformed. All the given information in this paper has been extracted from scientific literatures and ministry guidelines so this information is reliable and validated. The need of the hour is to monitor the actual number of beneficiaries of the Targeted Public Distribution System scheme. Furthermore, we should evaluate the impact of the scheme in mitigating the challenges of food insecurity in urban slum context. The policies on paper should be implemented on ground; if we could successfully implement the policy it will not only address the problem of food insecurity but also improve the nutrition status of the population. The government should take an initiative to issue ration card to all the citizen of India and there should be a fair ration shop in every locality. The government should monitor those shops on regular basis and beneficiary list should be revised within 5 year of interval to monitor the beneficiaries who have migrated and those who are really eligible for the scheme. Many studies has found that there has been rampant supply of illegal cards and multiple cards to family members of same household which needs to be corrected firstly. The ration dealers are overusing the power by selling the products in open market to earn profit which impact the beneficiary of the schemes. There is a need to regulate the FCI system and to keep daily check on the food grains as sometime due to negligence government has to undergo heavy losses i.e. tons of grains get rot in warehouse which can fed a lot. Currently the policy needs a better implementation strategy to benefit 100% eligibility group in India. If government can develop an model which can assimilate the whole program in one dashboard it will be more manageable and can bring down all the monetary losses.