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Radicals lose Round One on food bill by Radhika Ramaseshan


Conservatives appeared to trump the “radicals” as the Sonia Gandhi-headed National Advisory Council met today to consider revolutionary suggestions to widen the content and targets of a proposed “right to food” law.

The food rights campaigners in the council wanted a targeted public distribution system (PDS) to cover all except the affluent, providing not just cheap cereals but also other requirements of nursing mothers, children, the aged and the physically challenged.

The conservatives on the panel virtually rejected this on the ground of cost, proving they were on the same page as the government that has drafted a much more modest version of the food security bill.

“Complete universalisation (bringing above-poverty-line families within the targeted PDS) is ruled out. We have to factor in the availability of food grains, the cost of food subsidy and… whether the additional subsidy costs would be tenable with the fiscal consolidation scenario,” said a member of the panel, often described as the UPA’s social conscience keeper.

A compromise was then reached between the conservatives and the “radicals” — Harsh Mander, Aruna Roy and Jean Dreze, who apparently have Sonia’s support.

It was more or less decided that all below-poverty-line (BPL) families would be provided 35kg of cereals a month at Rs 3 a kg instead of the 25kg being thought of, even if this “entailed a strain” on government funds.

The Supreme Court too has ruled that 35kg is the least a BPL family is entitled to, but for now it appears that this would be the only concession granted to the “radicals”.

The radicals’ approach is based on the principle that every individual deserves “dignified economic and social access to adequate food and good nutrition at all times”. They say that apart from cereals, the entitlement should include subsidised oil and pulses for vulnerable groups like children below six, pregnant and nursing women, old people and the physically challenged.

No such statement of intent informs the draft of the food security bill, prepared by the empowered group of ministers, which includes P. Chidambaram, Sharad Pawar, A.K. Antony and Mamata Banerjee. At today’s meeting, the focus was on the draft. Sources said Sonia was unhappy with the ministerial panel’s efforts.

“There are several areas of contention that should hopefully be sorted out through many more meetings,” a panel member said.

Although the next meeting is on July 14, sources said it was “most unlikely” that the bill would be finalised before the monsoon session of Parliament.

Among the draft’s provisions that the “radicals” have rejected is a suggestion to replace the supply of food with cash, the de-linking of food security from nutritional security, and a blanket definition of BPL families without any provision for the “most vulnerable”.

Sources said Sonia backed the demands by Mander, Roy and Dreze for:

• A multi-layered classification of target groups that goes beyond the standard BPL definition;

• An obligation to prevent chronic starvation; and

• Creation of new entitlements for out-of-school children (who will be denied mid-day meals).

Food security experts have suggested that the bill not just provide wheat and rice but also look at alternative cereals such as millet, bajra and jowar. “For now, we are sticking to rice and wheat,” a panel member said.