Jaipur: Rajasthan government will review the list of more than one crore families taking free wheat under the National Food Security Act (NFSA). The state government has sought the list of Income Tax payers and four wheeler owners from the Income Tax and Transport departments. The names of beneficiaries of NFSA will be reconciled with the help of Aadhaar numbers.
“The state government wants to review the list of NFSA beneficiaries as no income tax payee or four wheeler owner can avail the benefits under NFSA," said the letter that has been sent to the Department of Income Tax and Transport by the Principal Secretary of Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department, Bhaskar A. Sawant. However, owners of tractors or other commercial vehicles that are used for livelihood, have been excluded from the review.
The development has taken place in the backdrop of announcement of LPG cylinder at Rs 450 for all the beneficiaries under NFSA. This scheme was rolled out for around 77 lakh beneficiaries of Ujjwala and families under the list of BPL by the previous Congress government of the state.
The incumbent BJP government has extended the scheme for all the families under NFSA. At present, 1 crore 7 lakh 35,652 families are covered under the NFSA list in Rajasthan, so the number of beneficiaries of LOG cylinder scheme has increased by almost 30 lakh families. This is going to put extra financial burden to the state government.
Besides this, number of cases have been reported of duplicate and forged entries in the NFSA list. Around 81 thousand government employees were found availing the benefit of Rs 2 per kg wheat under the scheme in the state two years ago.
