Mangaluru: The department of food and civil supplies has made linking of Aadhaar cards to ration cards a top priority. This comes in the wake of the Union government taking on itself the mission of ridding bogus ration cards and ensuring equitable distribution of public distribution system foodgrains to targeted beneficiaries.

The department has taken up the drive as per section 7 of the Targeted Delivery of Finance and Aadhaar Subsidies, Benefits and Services Act, 2016.

Incidentally, this was one of the big ticket reforms that Prime Minister Narendra Modi touted to mark the completion of two years of his government in May. Union minister of state for commerce (independent charge) Nirmala Sitharaman at the recent Vikas Parva rally here had pointed out that the Centre had saved nearly Rs 36,000 crore by way of weeding out bogus ration cards. This is helping the Centre ensure that the needy actually end up getting PDS benefits, she said.

Such has been the focus of the department on implementing the above act that it has temporarily put on hold issuing new ration cards till such time that above process (Aadhaar linkage) is completed. Raju Mogaveera, in-charge deputy director of the department, said the department has completed the process up to 89% and will complete linking the rest of the ration cards with respective cards at the earliest. "We are focusing our energies on this issue," he told STOI.

The department has issued 1,94,606 fresh cards in DK in the last three years since May 2013. This includes 15,663 AAY cards, 81,295 BPL cards and 97,678 APL cards to go with existing cards already issued in the above three categories. This ranks for among the highest number of cards distributed in the state, he said.

Adding even the commissioner of the department has instructed all deputy directors to complete the linking process at the earliest.