Direct Cash Transfer Scheme an invitation to starvation: VJAS

03 December, 2012

Direct cash transfer scheme of subsidy amount to the beneficiaries will adversely affect food starved Vidarbha's 10 million tribal and downtrodden people, as cash given to buy food from the market is likely to be diverted and families who are getting food under Annapurna and Anotyadaya are likely to face starvation.

VIDARBHA TRIBALS and farmers are protesting the central government's decision of direct cash transfer scheme on the grounds that poor people wouldn't be able to access their accounts in which the government will transfer the money.

According to the scheme, which would be implemented on a pilot basis, the government claims that cash transfer would be made directly into the accounts of beneficiaries. Alleging that this was an attempt to end the public distribution system, which would benefit the corporations, the tribals say that there was no guarantee that cash would be transferred to their accounts in time.

"It has been our experience that wages under MNREGA and old age widows' pension doesn't reach in time, what is the guarantee direct cash transfer will be made in time"? questioned the tribals.

The plans to extend the cash transfer scheme to food and cooking gas subsidies would hurt the poor as poor cannot be left at the mercy of market forces. The government cannot do away with subsidies.

The year-old pilot programme on cash transfers of 25,000 households in Kotkasim, a block in Rajasthan's Alwar district that borders Haryana, has failed miserably and the numbers tell a revealing story. Kerosene sales here have plummeted by over 70% as across the block, most residents said they had either received no money for one year, or at best just one of four instalments, according to The Times of India.