Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar seems to have put his weight behind the idea of direct cash transfers for social sector programmes of the government, including for the proposed food security Bill, as well as rejecting the National Advisory Council (NAC) proposal for universalisation of the Public Distribution System (PDS). He termed direct cash transfers as one of the few ways in which ?corruption in the implementation stage can be stemmed.?
Speaking at an interaction at the Indian Women’s Press Corp (IWPC), on his first trip to Delhi after his victory in the Assembly elections three months ago, Kumar said that he had tried out direct cash transfers in his highly successful scheme to provide bicycles to all girl children in the state, and found a ?92% success rate.?
?I don’t think any programme of the Centre and in any other state can boast of such success rates,? he said. ?The direct cash transfer will plug a lot of leakages in the distribution system as the PDS system is not working really, also it will give the poor an option in terms of their spending as well,? he said. When questioned on whether there were apprehensions that the cash might be used for other purposes rather than to buy food, he said, ?when a man is hungry the first thing he would do is to buy food.?
He also said that he was in favour of targeted PDS rather than universalisation as proposed by the NAC. ?We need to take care of the poor first,? he said.
Kumar and Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit are the two chief ministers who have actively proposed the direct cash transfer route. While new food and civil supplies minister K V Thomas gave both a patient hearing, he was of the opinion that the matter was more complicated than just giving money to the poor. ?The moment the government gets out of the business of procurement and distribution, its ability to intervene to help farmers and ordinary consumers in times of scarcity or speculation becomes severly impaired. What would happen to the Food Corporation of India and government procurement?? he said.
The matter was discussed at the highest levels of government but seems to have come up against some resistance particularly after the recent shortage of onions and continuing rising prices of food items. The government appears in little mood to take any chances.