WHY MILLIONS CANNOT CLAIM EMERGENCY FOOD RATIONS
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES Asheef Iqubbal
WHY MILLIONS
CANNOT CLAIM
EMERGENCY
FOOD RATIONS
DEF SoochnaPreneurs reaching out to citizens in remote
areas to offer them entitlements. A SoochnaPreneur
helping women from Naurangia Done village in Valmiki
Tiger Reserve area of West Champaran in Bihar.
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES:
Introduction
DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES is a series of in-depth
ground reports by the research team of Digital Empowerment
Foundation. They collect localised information about the masses
and how they are impacted through various situations emerging
because of the pandemic.
Digital Empowerment Foundation has been intensely working
across India with a digital infrastructure across 100 locations. Dur-
ing Covid-19, DEF has a privileged position to be present diversely
which helped in bringing a series of ground reports.PDS.qxp_Layout 1 03/04/21 7:39 AM Page 4
DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
It's been two years since Bihar's Manisha Devi,
a daily wager, applied for a new ration card.
WHY MILLIONS CANNOT CLAIM EMERGENCY FOOD RATIONS
In the food ration story, which was published in the Article14.
Date of Publication is 26 May 2020.
This article is a part of DEF’s Research and Advocacy paper series.
This work is licensed under a creative commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
You can modify and build upon document non-commercially, as long as you give credit to the original authors
and license your new creation under the identical terms.
Cover pictures: Digital Empowerment Foundation
Author: Asheef Iqubbal
Design and Layout: Shaifali Chikermane
Year of Publication: 2020
Re-published and Distributed by:
Digital Empowerment Foundation
House no. 44, 2nd and 3rd Floor (next to Naraina IIT Academy)
Kalu Sarai (near IIT Flyover)
New Delhi – 110016
Tel: 91-11-42233100 / Fax: 91-11-26532787
Email: def@defindia.net | URL: www.defindia.org
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
WHY MILLIONS CANNOT CLAIM
EMERGENCY FOOD RATIONS
To stave off mass hunger, the government has offered 5 “I’m tired of making
kg rice and 1 kg pulses to only ration-card holders, leav- the rounds for the (ra-
ing 100 million poor Indians ineligible because the tion) card,” said Devi,
master list uses nine-year-old data. And thousands with whose husband is a
ration cards find them useless. daily wage labourer.
New Delhi: It has been more than
two years since Manisha Devi, 35, ap- “I’m tired of making the rounds for the
plied for a correction in her ration (ration) card,” said Devi, whose hus-
card, the document that 814 million band is a daily wage labourer.
Indians officially classified as poor
must have to get cheap food from the “Before the lockdown, I would find
government1 . work in the fields, my husband would
also find some work in the village,”
When she was single, Devi shared her said Devi from Pachkahar in Bihar’s
name on the ration card with her West Champaran district. “In this way,
father. After marriage, when she we would somehow make ends meet.”
sought a new ration card, she was dis-
allowed from applying for a fresh one, She said her husband and her had now
since her name already existed on the taken a loan of Rs 7,000 from a local
old ration card. moneylender at an interest of 4% per
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
The COVID-19 shut- month, “to make sure we have some- jobs13 in April, about 75% of them were
thing to eat”. She is not clear how they small traders and daily wage labourers,
down has contracted will repay the loan. according to estimates from the Centre
India’s once-growing for Monitoring Indian Economy4, a
economy, pushing mil- “I don’t know how we will be able to think tank, which said the rural job
lions of vulnerable survive this way,” she said. loss rate was 22.79% for the week end-
ing 24 May. This unprecedented rise in
people closer to the Sikander Khwas, a Mumbai carpenter, unemployment has further stressed
edge. More than lives in the same neighbourhood. He India’s struggling social-protection re-
131,000 had con- was visiting for a relative’s wedding gime and heightened the precarious-
when the lockdown was announced on ness of those who fall outside the food
tracted the virus by 24 24 March 2020 as a public-health security net, said experts5.
May in India and measure against the Coronavirus, leav-
more than 3,800 were ing him unemployed. Early in the COVID-19 crisis, on 27
March, Finance Minister Nirmala Sita-
dead. Now in its second month, the lock- raman announced that under the Prad-
down has led to large-scale loss of han Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana
livelihoods for India’s informal and (Prime Minister’s Poor Welfare
migrant workers. Khwas neither has a Scheme) 5 kg rice or wheat and 1 kg
source of income nor adequate food. pulses (dal), would be made available
He unsuccessfully applied for a ration free to ration-card holders for three
card in 2018. months, in addition to what they nor-
mally collect6. The government is now
“I have made so many rounds of Nar- considering extending this free ration
katiaganj (the block headquarters) that for up to three more months, the
I am tired now, but the card still hasn’t Times of India reported on 26 May7.
been made,” said 31-year-old Khwas,
who borrowed Rs 5,000 from a relative On 2 May, Consumer Affairs, Food and
to survive. “Once 10 of us even went to Public Distribution Minister Ram Vilas
the block office, as well as to the village Paswan said his government would en-
mukhiya (elected head of the village), sure 3.9 million people—1.4 million in
but we were not heard. If only I had Bihar alone—without ration cards be-
the ration card today, I would have cause of “inclusion errors” would also
been able to feed my family two square benefit from Sitaraman’s announce-
meals a day without depending on any- ment.
one.”
“We are ready to meet all additional
The COVID-19 shutdown has con- foodgrain requirements,” Paswan told
tracted India’s once-growing economy, the Hindustan Times. “We have
pushing millions of vulnerable people enough stocks. Our aim is to ensure
closer to the edge. More than 131,000 everybody has food”8.
had contracted the virus by 24 May in
India and more than 3,800 were dead2. The lack of ration cards for people like
Devi and Khwas are a result of the in-
More than 122 million people lost their clusion errors Paswan referred to.
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
Their vulnerability increases as they The probable reason for this discrep- Many migrant
borrow money to buy food. It is ancy is the Centre’s unwillingness to
unclear if Paswan’s promise will de- use updated data of the population to
workers have had
liver Sitaraman’s promised ration. calculate state-wise NFSA coverage13. their names removed
If the Central Government is counting from the ration card
The Architecture Of Exclusion on the 2021 census data, that could be list as they left their
delayed due to the pandemic.
According to the National Food Secur- villages for work, said
ity Act (NFSA), 20139, all families fall- Many migrant workers have had their Siraj Dutta, who is af-
ing below the poverty line get names removed from the ration card filiated with the Right
foodgrain at subsidised rates. As per list as they left their villages for work,
the NFSA, the Public Distribution Sys- said Siraj Dutta, who is affiliated with to Food Campaign, an
tem (PDS)10 is supposed to cover 75% the Right to Food Campaign14, an ad- advocacy. Ration
of the population in rural areas and vocacy. Ration cards are deactivated if cards are deactivated
50% in urban areas, which is 67% of beneficiaries have not purchased es-
the overall population (using rural- sential commodities for three consecu-
if beneficiaries have
urban population ratio as per the 2011 tive months15. not purchased essen-
census). tial commodities for
As they return home amidst the lock- three consecutive
Calculations by economists Jean down, this erasure is becoming the
Dreze, Reetika Khera, and Meghana cause for their exclusion. According to months.
Mungikar show that using census 2011 many families, the process for applying
data as the basis for calculating food for a new ration card is complicated
security eligibility has left 100 million and often protracted.
eligible individuals—the equivalent of
the population of Egypt—outside the “Even after having applied for one,
food safety net11. there is hardly any progress on getting
a ration card,” said Dutta. “In Jhark-
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have the hand alone, 700,000 cases are buried
widest gaps, with an estimated 28 in government files16. People depend
million and 18 million outside on e-governance centres to make ap-
food security coverage, respect- plications, but due to the lockdown,
ively. In many cases, new ration reaching these centres is difficult. And,
cards are not issued since the in rural areas, the lack of banks makes
numbers stand saturated because these centers even more crowded.”
of the 2011 census.
These centres, also known by unique
However, Minister for Consumer Af- state names, such as Pragya Kendras in
fairs, Food and Public Distribution Jharkhand, are physical facilities that
Ram Vilas Pawan said on 23 April that deliver government of India e-services
the NFSA is supposed to cover only 710 to rural and remote locations where
million nationwide, of which 3.9 mil- access to computers and Internet is
lion receive no benefits because they negligible.
have no ration card12. Out of this 3.9
million, Bihar accounts for 1.4 million. However, persistent bottlenecks often
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
During the pandemic, prevent smooth public-service delivery However, individuals have been
through such centers, IndiaSpend re- denied rations because they do
many states have ported on 25 November 201917. not currently use the mobile
stopped providing ra- Mahmood Ali, who runs a Pragya Ken- number registered with Aadhaar.
tions through biomet- dra in Tigri, a village in Ranchi district
ric authentication as a of Jharkhand, said that the govern- A woman in Uttar Pradesh’s Badaun
ment, often, does nothing for up to six district died while waiting in queue for
public health and month after receiving a ration-card ap- two days to receive her ration, accord-
safety measure, plication. ing to BBC Hindi19. The postmortem
switching to one-time- report has not been released, but offi-
“People have to keep visiting the learn- cials suspected that she died of a car-
passwords delivered ing centers to find out if any progress diac arrest.
to registered mobile has been made,” said Ali. “Sometimes
numbers. However, the applications are stalled for months People Might Die Of Starvation
either at the block level or district of- First
individuals have been fice.” Reasons can include technical
denied rations because and biometric issues, crowding and “In general, the process of making a ra-
they do not currently store shutdowns. tion card has always been complicated;
use the mobile number Technical issues, particularly with (in the current scenario) there is no
Aadhaar—a 12 digit unique number as- time to be lost in applying for a new ra-
registered with Aad- signed to all Indian residents—have tion card and to then determin(ing)
haar. significantly constrained access to ra- who is eligible and who isn’t,” said
tion cards, argued Reetika Kheera and Dipa Sinha, assistant professor of
Anmol Somanchi, associate professor economics at Ambedkar University.
and research associate at the Indian “The government needs to ensure that
Institute of Management (IIM) Ahme- anyone with documents that proves
dabad. one’s identity should be granted ra-
tion.”
“It (Aadhaar) excludes people in three
main ways: cancellation of cards (or Some states, such as Jharkhand,
names on ration cards) if people do not Chhattisgarh and Delhi have done so
have an Aadhaar number, if they fail to but have made the Aadhar number
link it with their ration card, and fail- mandatory. “Amidst this pandemic,
ure of the Aadhaar-based biometric they should make any document of
authentication at the time of purchas- identity enough to qualify for ration,”
ing grain,” they wrote on 25 April in said Sinha.
Economic and Political Weekly18.
“The central government should pro-
During the pandemic, many vide the state governments with ra-
states have stopped providing ra- tions, since ration is rotting in the
tions through biometric authenti- warehouses20 of the central govern-
cation as a public health and ment and after the rabi (winter) crop
safety measure, switching to one- there will be a need to buy more ra-
time-passwords delivered to reg- tion,” said Sinha. “State governments
istered mobile numbers. don’t have enough money to buy and
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DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES
deliver both themselves”. The Supreme Court of
“While dealing with one crisis, the
Starvation and malnutrition have al- situation may not lead to the creation
India ordered the dis-
ways been endemic issues in India— of another crisis,” the court order said. tribution of nutritional
they account for 68% of deaths of food to qualifying con-
children under the age of five — and It is doubtful that this public-service stituents through the
the socio-economic conditions caused delivery system will operate at full ca-
by COVID-19 exacerbate these vulner- pacity during the lockdown. In Bihar, home delivery system
abilities21. The mid-day meal system is for instance, 66.4% of those eligible for during the lockdown
currently unavailable since schools mid-day meals did not receive any- in a notice issued on
have closed, as have anganwadis, thing from anganwadis; the cor-
childcare centres that combat hunger responding figure for Madhya Pradesh 18 March 2020 to the
and malnutrition, leaving pregnant was 49% and Jharkhand 39.7%, Centre, states and
women, lactating mothers, and News18 reported on 20 April24. union territories.
children under the age of six the food
and nutrition that they were entitled to Vandana Prasad of the Public Health
under the Integrated Child Devel- Resource Network25, a group of re-
opment Services Scheme22. searchers, said India’s healthcare sys-
tem “is not very good” but a lack of
The Supreme Court of India ordered food worsens the situation. “If we
the distribution of nutritional food to don’t make other arrangements along
qualifying constituents through the with ration,” said Prasad, “People will
home delivery system during the lock- die of disorganization more than from
down in a notice issued on 18 March the virus.”
2020 to the Centre, states and union
territories23.
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References crore of PDS: economists. The Hindu. Retrieved from
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/outdated-census-data-deprives-over-
1 Scroll Staff. (15 April 2020). 100 million Indians fall through gaps in food safety 10-crore-of-pds-economists/article31350648.ece [27 February 2021].
net, economists urge rethink on Covid-19 relief. Scroll. Retrieved from 14 http://www.righttofoodcampaign.in
https://scroll.in/article/959235/100-million-indians-fall-through-gaps-in-food- 15 DHNS. (29 June 2018). Cancel ration cards for 3-month non-drawal: Paswan.
safety-net-economists-urge-rethink-on-covid-19-relief [03 March 2021]. Deccan Herald. Retrieved from https://www.deccanherald.com/national/top-na-
2 https://corona.health-check.in/ tional-stories/cancel-ration-cards-3-month-677944.html [27 February 2021].
3 The Hindu Data Team. (07 May 2020). An estimated 12.2 crore Indians lost their 16 Dreze, J. (09 April 2020). Excess stocks of the Food Corporation of India must
jobs during the coronavirus lockdown in April: CMIE. The Hindu. Retrieved from be released to the poor. Indian Express. Retrieved from
https://www.thehindu.com/data/data-over-12-crore-indians-lost-their-jobs-dur- https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/coronavirus-lockdown-food-
ing-the-coronavirus-lockdown-in-april/article31520715.ece [27 February 2021). for-poor-migrants-mass-exodus-jean-dreze-6353790/ [27 February 2021].
4 https://www.cmie.com/ 17 Parthasarathy, A. & Narayanan, R. (25 November 2019). Digital India’s ‘Magic
5 Khera, R. & Somanchi, A. (25 April 2020). COVID-19 and Aadhaar: Why the Wand’ Creates More Problems Than Solutions In Jharkhand, Finds Survey. In-
Union Government’s Relief Package is an Exclusionary Endeavour. Economic and diaSpend. Retrieved from https://www.indiaspend.com/digital-indias-magic-
Political Weekly. Retrieved from https://www.epw.in/engage/article/covid-19- wand-creates-more-problems-than-solutions-in-jharkhand-finds-survey/ [27
and-aadhaar-why-union-governments-relief [27 February 2021]. February 2021].
6 ET Bureau. (27 March 2020). FM Nirmala Sitharaman announces Rs 1.7 lakh 18 Khera, R. & Somanchi, A. (25 April 2020). COVID-19 and Aadhaar: Why the
crore relief package for poor. Economic Times. Retrieved from https://economic- Union Government’s Relief Package is an Exclusionary Endeavour. Economic and
times.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/fm-nirmala-sitharaman-announces- Political Weekly. Retrieved from https://www.epw.in/engage/article/covid-19-
rs-1-7-lakh-crore-relief-package-for-poor/articleshow/74825054.cms?from=mdr and-aadhaar-why-union-governments-relief [27 February 2021].
[27 February 2021]. 19 Mishr, S. (18 April 2020). oo o u: e
e i i e
7 Sidhartha & Gupta, S. (25 May 2020). Government may give foodgrains to 80 i . BBC Hindi. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/hindi/india-
crore people for 2-3 mths more. Times of India. Retrieved from 52338267 [27 February 2021].
https://www.pressreader.com/india/the-times-of-india-mumbai- 20 Dreze, J. (09 April 2020). Excess stocks of the Food Corporation of India must
edition/20200525/281994674693972 [27 February 2021]. be released to the poor. Indian Express. Retrieved from
8 Haq, Z. (02 May 2020). Centre to offer cheap grains to 3.9 million more people. https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/coronavirus-lockdown-food-
Hindustan Times. Retrieved from https://www.hindustantimes.com/india- for-poor-migrants-mass-exodus-jean-dreze-6353790/ [27 February 2021].
news/centre-to-offer-cheap-grains-to-3-9-million-more-people/story- 21 Yadavar, S. (19 September 2019). Why India Is Likely To Miss Its Nutrition Tar-
WRSyZxCh31WhnClRAZZg6H.html [27 February 2021]. gets For 2022. IndiaSpend. Retrieved from https://www.indiaspend.com/why-
9 Government of India. india-is-likely-to-miss-its-nutrition-targets-for-2022/ [27 February 2021].
http://www.egazette.nic.in/WriteReadData/2013/E_29_2013_429.pdf 22 https://icds-wcd.nic.in/
10 https://pdsportal.nic.in/main.aspx 23 Tripathi, S. (18 March 2020). COVID-19: With schools shut and mid-day meals
11 Scroll Staff. (15 April 2020). 100 million Indians fall through gaps in food safety unavailable to children, SC issues notice to states, UTs. Deccan Herald. Retrieved
net, economists urge rethink on Covid-19 relief. Scroll. Retrieved from from https://www.deccanherald.com/national/covid-19-with-schools-shut-and-
https://scroll.in/article/959235/100-million-indians-fall-through-gaps-in-food- mid-day-meals-unavailable-to-children-sc-issues-notice-to-states-uts-
safety-net-economists-urge-rethink-on-covid-19-relief [03 March 2021]. 814955.html [27 February 2021].
12 Press Trust of India. (23 April 2020). 14 Lakh People In Bihar Not Getting Food 24 Team101Reporters. (20 April 2020). No Ration, No Pension, No Benefits: How
Security Benefits, Says Union Minister. NDTV. Retrieved from Covid-19 Lockdown Crippled Over 50% in Bihar, Jharkhand & MP. News18. Re-
https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/14-lakh-people-in-bihar-not-getting-benefits- trieved from https://www.news18.com/news/india/no-ration-no-pension-no-
under-food-security-act-minister-ram-vilas-paswan-2217198?amp=1&akamai- benefits-how-covid-19-lockdown-crippled-over-50-bihar-jharkhand-mp-2584837.
rum=off&__twitter_impression=true [27 February 2021]. html [27 February 2021].
13 Special Correspondent. (15 April 2020). Outdated census data deprives over 10 25 https://phrsindia.org/
10 WHY MILLIONS CANNOT CLAIM EMERGENCY FOOD RATIONSPDS.qxp_Layout 1 03/04/21 7:39 AM Page 11
DEF COVID-19 GROUND REPORT SERIES Asheef Iqubbal
A SoochnaPreneur helping a family from
Naurangia Done village in Valmiki Tiger
Reserve area of West Champaran in Bihar.You can also read
