Chief Minister Siddaramaiah gets highly defensive whenever someone questions the rationale behind the Anna Bhagya scheme is questioned.
But the fact remains that his government has distributed Re 1-kg rice and other highly subsidised groceries to ineligible 8.90 lakh below poverty line (BPL) and Anna Antyodaya card holders in the last two years.
In a written reply to Gurupadappa Nagamarapalli (BJP) in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday, Minister of State for Food and Civil Supplies, Dinesh Gundu Rao, has stated that in the last two years, 8,89,907 BPL and APL cards were identified and cancelled. In Bengaluru alone, 1,00,917 bogus cards and 71,637 bogus cards in Bengaluru Urban district have been scrapped. The least number of such cards were cancelled in Chamarajanagar district - 6,267.
The government has also identified 10,29,924 APL cards as ineligible for the highly subsidised ration. The minister said up to June 15, 9,79,796 AAY, 1,00,25,883 BPL and 11,77,216 APL cards had been distributed. The department has begun accepting applications online for new ration cards from May 1. As many as 8,78,659 applications have been received, he said.
Replying to a question by Umesh Katti (BJP), the minister said licences of 220 fair price depots had been suspended for their illegal business.
Funds for Anna Bhagya
To a question as to how much has been spent on implementing the Anna Bhagya scheme, the minister stated that in 2013-14, the year the scheme was launched, Rs 3,046.04 crore was spent from the exchequer; in 2014-15 - Rs 2,533.28 crore, and Rs 399 crore up to May-end in 2015-16.