Hyderabad: Weeding out ration cards is normally fraught with political landmines for any state government that tom-toms its welfare-oriented initiatives. What if the Union government hands them a big list of ration cards that could be weeded out! The state government will only improve on the Centre’s job of weeding out.

The Centre, raising concerns over ‘ineligible’ people availing benefits through the PDS (Public Distribution System), is understood to have identified close to 1 lakh cards under which ‘ineligible’ people have been availing PDS benefits. That list has been sent to the state government. Armed with that list, the State Civil Supplies Department is now in combat mode to weed out all ‘unused’ ration cards.

In remarkably quick time, the officials have identified over 1.5 lakh families which they failed to receive their share of the rationed items at least for the past six months.

The Centre’s list pertained to discrepancies such as persons having similar family details in rations cards issued by other States, death of the card holder, and persons obtaining ration card through fraudulent means. So, the state authorities have been directed to verify these cards. Now, the Civil Supplies officials have begun examining all cards and started making inquiries. The authorities have expedited the process, which is now in the final stages. District-level officials and mandal-level officials are conducting field investigations and recording the information online, official sources told The Hans India.

It is believed that upon completion of this process, most of the cards in the list sent by the Centre are likely to be canceled due to the ‘ineligibility’ factor, whatever be the reason.

As of now, from among the cards sanctioned by the Centre, about 80 per cent of the cards have been examined. It was found that 30 per cent of the cards pertain to ‘ineligible’ beneficiaries. It came to light that the beneficiaries of several of these cards have not been receiving rationed items for 6 to 12 months.

This being so, the state government has approved the addition of 2 lakh new ration cards. The verification process is on and authorities aver that ‘eligible’ applicants would continue to receive ration cards upon scrutiny of the applications. Citizens who had applied through MeeSeva centers or public governance platforms are encouraged to track the status of their application. The government also announced that beneficiaries can collect three months’ worth of subsidised rice at once in June. This move is expected to ease the burden on families and reduce congestion at ration distribution centers, the officials added.