Lahore: In Punjab, every person with ID card above 18 years of age has been declared eligible to get free flour.
The system of providing targeted food subsidy only to deserving families by providing free flour in the province has been done away with and under the new system free flour is provided to all persons above 18 years of age who have an ID card based on their residential address in Punjab. has been declared eligible to take.
At present, in the Benazir Income Support Program, 3 bags are being provided to a registered family (average of 6 people) while 1 bag is being provided to an unregistered person free of charge. Bags should be provided, but the bureaucracy has opposed it. In this regard, important decisions are expected in the meeting chaired by the Prime Minister in Islamabad today.
Till last day, 1 crore 40 lakh bags have been distributed, however, after the change in the method of distribution of free flour, the Punjab caretaker government’s target of distribution of 4 crore 74 lakh bags has practically been lost. According to the new preliminary estimate. The number of free flour bags is likely to exceed 8 crore.
After a big increase in the demand for free flour, due to the low stocks of government wheat, the Food Department of Punjab has requested the federal government to supply 3 lakh tonnes more wheat from the wheat held by PASCO. Tons of wheat has been provided.
It should be noted that on the special instructions of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, the caretaker Punjab government had started a scheme to give 30 kg of free flour to 1 crore 58 lakh deserving families registered with an income of less than 60 thousand per month under the Benazir Income Support Program with the financial cooperation of the federal government. However, due to technical problems, poor management planning and extraordinary public rush, free flour distribution centers across Punjab have become denga mushti, a hotbed of disorder.
Till last day, 9 people have died while getting free flour while the majority of unregistered people are also causing problems at the centers. The registration procedure in the Benazir Income Support Program is complicated and time-consuming, and the public rush is increasing. Considering this situation, the Prime Minister has ended the targeted subsidy plan only for the deserving people.
According to the new decision, now every person aged 18 and above who has an identity card with Punjab residential address can get one bag of 10 kg flour free (for the time being), on this order. The implementation has started since yesterday, after which it is becoming difficult for Flourmills to meet the increasing demand of free flour.
Meanwhile, in many cities including Rawalpindi, flour mills are facing difficulties due to non-release of due government wheat quota for supplying flour mills free of charge. Free flour wheat was not supplied to the mills till yesterday.
According to the sources, flourmills have been instructed to take the regular government quota from Hafizabad due to the low level of government wheat reserves in Rawalpindi.
On the other hand, due to multiple interruptions in the app, the speed of distribution of free flour has been slow, public outrage has started increasing and there is a fear of fraud in the operation of manual registration. According to sources in Punjab government departments, “BISP” authorities are not cooperating regarding data sharing.
(function(d, s, id){
var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];
if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;}
js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;
js.src = “//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3&appId=770767426360150”;
fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);
}(document, ‘script’, ‘facebook-jssdk’));
(function(d, s, id) {
var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];
if (d.getElementById(id)) return;
js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;
js.src = “//connect.facebook.net/en_GB/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.7”;
fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);
}(document, ‘script’, ‘facebook-jssdk’));