-The Economic Times Grain stocks with state agencies are likely to cross 75 million tonnes some time in June 2012, while covered capacity to store is less than 50 million tonnes. The rest would be under CAP (with pucca or even kachcha plinths) exposed to potential large-scale damage. An early and rational policy decision is required to reduce the stocks by at least 7-10 million tonnes to avoid high costs of...

-The Economic Times Ashok Gulati, chairman of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices, warns that India will have a record food grain stock of 75 million tonnes by June when wheat procurement for the year would be over. A third of it would be stored in the open, and vulnerable to damage from rain, as covered storage capacity is only 50 million tonnes. If these stocks are not run down...

-Down to Earth Biometric-based unique identity or Aadhaar is leading to huge problems for people working for the rural employment guarantee scheme and for others receiving welfare benefits. Not only have enrolments been done shoddily but the experience of the pilot projects shows that it is almost impossible to authenticate the work-hardened fingerprints of the poor, find Latha Jishnu and Jyotika Sood. Besides, there is the overwhelming issue of deficient online...

The crux of the problem is not leakages, but unsold stocks. The debate on the Public Distribution System is being increasingly overwhelmed by the issue of corruption. The pressures on the system are seen primarily, if not entirely, as one of leakages. This preoccupation with leakages has reached a point where the government appears set to throw up its hands and just hand over cash to families, irrespective of whether they...

-The Hindustan Times The government stocks a fifth of its grain out in the open, left to be washed by the monsoon. As the UPA’s most ambitious welfare programme — food security for poor Indians — is unrolled, more grain will be collected and allowed to rot unless warehouses are built to stock an additional 35 million tonnes beyond the 110 million tonnes of storage we already have, the Planning Commission...