NEW DELHI(CommodityOnline) : As India about to embark the historic food security bill which guarantees cheap foodgrains to millions of poor in the country, senior minister Sharad Pawar said implementing the bill under the current PDS system is almost impossible.
Speaking at a seminar here, Pawar, Agriculture ministrer of India said a massive process re-engineering was required to make the PDS compatible with the food bill.
Pawar has been a critique of the food bill for a long time and explained that there are serious limitations in the existing PDS and asked every state to take up the reforms in the PDS in mission mode before implementing the food security bill.
Analysts say at least a third of subsidized food sales doesn't reach the targeted poor because of leakages in the state-administered distribution network.
India is comfortably positioned with foodgrain stocks this year after two successive bumper crops, but analysts say the food security program could face serious challenges in a year of scanty rainfall.
