Centre to Rename National Food Security Act

In a bid to maintain uniformity in the quantity of food grains and the price at which they are distributed across the country under the provisions of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) 2013, the Centre is contemplating a change in the nomenclature of the legislation to Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Khadya Suraksha Yojana.

According to sources, apart from ensuring uniformity in the quantity of food grains supplied under NFSA and their price, a significant driving point which has led the Centre to look at amending the name of the Act is that several state governments tend to top up the Central subsidy provided to them for implementing the provisions of NFSA with a nominal amount and run it as their own variant, even as the majority of the subsidy burden is borne by the Central government.

They added that several such state governments through their schemes, which are variants of NFSA, even provide food grains free of cost to the beneficiaries and sometimes even at less than the price mandated under the Central Act.

Therefore, to check such 'variations' and to desist the state governments from running variants of NFSA and claiming them as their own initiatives, the Centre aims to change its nomenclature by prefixing it with the title 'Pradhan Mantri', sources pointed out.

Meanwhile, there is a possibility that all such schemes run by the states may be subsumed under the NFSA once it is implemented with a new nomenclature.

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