An effort to get ration card for poor and deserving villagers - Part-II

Many poor families in the villages of Thiruppeyar, Thiruppeyar Thakka, and Pudukalani are not having a ration card for more than 6 years.  Earlier, they had their names on their parents’ ration cards; however, once they got their own family and children, their name was removed from the existing ration card. Therefore, such people had applied for a new ration card. However, upon applying for a new ration card, their applications were never processed by the concerned Ulundurpettai Taluka Office. More than 40 families from these villages are living without a ration card even now.

Many of them have made applications more than five times. However, there were no official communications about their applications. Only the applicants who filed RTI application, issued a legal notice, RTI seeking ration card could get a ration card. That too after extraordinary delay as mentioned in my previous post.

It was stated by the Taluka Supply Officer (TSO), Ulundurpettai that the district administration temporarily stopped issuing a ration card and however resumed now (2016 July) in one of RTI reply. However, there was no reason for that as well. Even after that period also ration card was not issued to the above said villagers except the one who took an extraordinary effort of issuing a legal notice.

In an effort to get a ration card for the poor villagers, on 08.11.2016, I filed RTI application before the District Supply Office, Villupuram seeking a copy of the order of the district administration, which instructs concerned authorities to stop the printing of ration card temporarily for Ulundurpettai Taluka and the number of ration card issued to residents belong to Ulundurpettai Taluka village-wise during January 2011 to October 2016. For that, the said application was transferred to Ulundurpettai Taluka Office. However, till date, there was no reply from either of said office.

I also contacted the Taluka Supply Office to request him to process the ration card applications of these poor villagers. For that, he stated that many of the applications were not properly filed. Therefore, I and my brother helped around 20 applicants to file new ration card applications during the month of December 2016.

Then in the month of March 2017, the Tamil Nadu Government announced that from the 1^st April 2017 ration card applications must be filed in online mode. Taking this as an excuse, the Taluka Supply Officer, asked the applicant to file again through online mode. Against this, I Issued legal notice to the Taluka Supply Officer (TSO) as well as District Supply Officer on 18.04.2017 requesting processing of ration card application and opposing TSO’s arbitrariness. For that, the District Supply Officer instructed the TSO to take necessary action. However, nothing happened. Meanwhile, villagers also started applying for ration card through online mode as well. Still, their applications were not processed by the concerned authorities.

On 08.09.2017, I sent a legal notice on the behalf of 22 ration card applicants, this time to the District Collector, Villupuram & Principal Secretary, Food & Civil Supply Department as well. For the District Collector instructed the TSO, Ulundurpettai to take action immediate action. And even upon Principal Secretary’s reference, the Commissioner of Food Supply & Consumer Protection Department also instructed via a letter dated 22.09.2017 to the District administration to take immediate action to redress the grievances of the ration card applicant. However, nothing has been done till date. As of now to my knowledge, there are 35 ration card applicants, who are waiting for more than 8 months after applying through online mode, and authorities are not ready to process.

On 8^th January 2018, I contacted the Deputy Commissioner’s office (Food Supply & Consumer Protection Department) at 9445000150 and complained about the failure of Taluka Supply Office, Ulundurpettai to process ration card applications. For that, he stated that the processing of a new ration card has been stopped in order to facilitate the printing of smart cards to the existing ration cardholders. He also stated that it will take at least two more months for starting the processing of new applications. Therefore, I have now filed an RTI application seeking a copy of the Government instruction/order, which states the above said reason for stopping the processing of the ration card applicants. 

#PDS #RationCard #Ration #TSO #Food #FoodSupply