Union Minister Pralhad Joshi met Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel and attended a meeting to review the preparations ahead of the 4th RE-Invest Meet scheduled to be held in the state from September 16 to 18.
Prahlad Joshi expressed a clear opinion that the technological initiatives adopted by the Gujarat government in the public distribution system under the guidance of CM Patel are a guide for other states of the country.
In this context, he said that the performance of the Department of Food and Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs of the State Government in various schemes is also good. Not only this, the transparency that has been adopted by integrating technology is a robust system that other states can follow.
Joshi, during his visit to Gujarat, after paying a courtesy call on CM Patel in Gandhinagar, reviewed the presentation of activities of the Food Civil Supply Department in a meeting chaired by the Chief Minister.
State Food Civil Supplies Minister Kunwarjibhai Bavaliya, Minister of State Bhikhusinh Parmar as well as Chief Secretary Rajkumar, Additional Chief Secretary to Chief Minister Pankaj Joshi and senior officials of the state and central government joined this meeting.
According to a press release, Gujarat government has developed a foolproof system including supply chain automation, live tracking of vehicles, supply chain monitoring with 250 plus 7500 CCTV cameras in godowns at state level through command and control center for the purpose of ensuring last mile delivery of various food grains.
The minister appreciated that Gujarat is saving an average of Rs 53 lakh per month by implementing route automation as recommended by the central government to increase grain transportation efficiently.
‘My Ration’ mobile app has been launched in the state and e-KYC through face authentication from mobile. The process has been started. More than 59 lakh people have benefited from this process and more than 20 lakh people have downloaded this mobile app, the details of which were presented to the Union Minister in the meeting.
Through the dashboard’s feedback mechanism system, the beneficiaries are contacted telephonically to obtain responses-feedback on the public distribution system. About the success of this system, the Union Minister was told that 95 percent of people have expressed satisfaction about the distribution system and quality, the release added.
Not only this, 90 percent of the complaints received by the State Level Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission and 96 percent of the District Level Commission have been redressed in the last 3 years.
In promoting the purchase and distribution of millet-food, under the direction of Chief Minister Patel, the state government has done excellent work and has paid 470 crore rupees to the farmers by purchasing 1,70,600 MT of millet at support price.
The Union Minister also noted that 69.94 lakh transactions have been done so far by Gujarat as a pilot project of One Nation-One Ration Card.
CM Patel has given clear directions to the department to adopt zero tolerance policy to maintain the quality of grains, pulses, edible oil, etc. Under this Public Distribution System, P.M. Nutrition, ICDS All the food stuffs made for it are distributed only after passing through the strict quality criteria of the Food Research Laboratory.
Union Minister Joshi was also impressed by such foolproof system of Gujarat. Joshi also said that the central government will give proper consideration regarding the central allocation of various food grains to the state.
Ramesh Meena, Principal Secretary, Food and Civil Supplies Department, gave detailed information about the performance of Gujarat in the public distribution system of the state government as well as central and state schemes through a presentation.
(With ANI Inputs)
