In the recent press conference organised in Delhi by the Right to Food Campaign on the mandatory E-KYC drive, Sumaira, a domestic worker informed the media that she spent ₹ 8,000 to travel to her village in Uttar Pradesh with 7 members of the family to present themselves for verification for the Electric Know Your Customer (E-KYC) process as their ration card is from UP.
They had to stay in UP for 15 days and lost their daily wages in the process. The process was delayed as the EKYC of one child was not successful and they had to wait to get it updated.
Sumaira’s plight is one among countless ration cardholders in the country. The One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC) scheme, implemented in 2020, is operational nationwide, but with exception of metro cities such as Delhi and Mumbai, it is poorly implemented across the country.
Thus, some like Sumaira can avail rations in their place of work, by virtue of being in Delhi. Yet, owing to challenges posed by poor digital infrastructure and insensitive procedures outlined by the government, many poor families such as Sumaira are having to travel long distances to their towns and villages to get the E-KYC verification done. Losing daily wages and incurring additional expenses in the process.
The Fair Price Shop (FPS) dealers across the country have been ordered through a simple text message, by the Ministry of Food and Civil Supplies, to conduct an E-KYC verification of all 81 crore people who have ration cards and are entitled to receive food grains under the National Food Security Act (NFSA).
E-KYC is a verification process where each member mentioned on the family ration card has to physically be present at the ration shop to authenticate their identity through their Aadhar card. In obeying the orders, FPS dealers are informing all ration cardholders in their list.
In this process, the migrant population is also getting informed about this exercise and that raises many questions which need to be resolved in the first place.
All the efforts and resources being spent in this exercise are at a time when crores of people are excluded from food security coverage because the Government failed to conduct the Census of 2021. Presently, the quotas for NFSA are estimated using the 2011 census, which, it is estimated, leads to an exclusion of more than 12 crore individuals who would have been covered had the updated population figures been used.
Ironically, the E-KYC verification exercise for removing unwanted beneficiaries (dead, fake, etc) from the food security coverage list is turning out to be a real threat to most of the genuine ration cardholder population, particularly the migrant population.
The whole power to complete this exercise has been given to the FPS dealers. This is a surprise as FPS dealers have no role in issuing and cancelling ration cards as it is the responsibility of the food department. By giving such powers to the person who is responsible for distributing the ration, the government has weakened and abandoned its responsibility towards the ration cardholder.
In many states, ration cardholders are being informed to complete their E-KYC verification at the ration shop and do the most challenging task, “prove their authenticity to a machine”. The E-KYC verification faces the same challenges as the daily struggle to access ration. Card holders face difficulties when the Electronic Point of Sale (e-pos) machine fails to recognise thumbprints, and poor internet connection leads to delays in accessing ration.
Similarly, many such centralised technical interventions in ration distribution have created hurdles for the masses rather than facilitating the process. The Fair Price Shop dealers in many instances have informed cardholders that failure to get E-KYC verification will result in the cancellation of ration cards or removal of names and denial of food grains. This has created a situation of panic among millions of cardholders dependent upon monthly rations.
‘Server Down’, Rations Denied
Starting a verification exercise without providing clear information raises some existing problems related to ration access. The usual refrain of ‘server down hai (server is down)’ by dealers at the E-pos machine at the ration shop due to poor internet connection and biometric-related difficulties are regular concerns in this verification exercise.
The E-KYC verification is ongoing in an exclusionary manner. By forcing all holders of the ration card to be physically present for the completion, it especially ignores the outstation students, migrant workers, old age and disabled population, who find it difficult to present themselves at the shop. The rigid conditions and potential consequences of not being able to fulfil E-KYC verification, owing to lacunae in technology and hurdles posed by requirements to be physically present, have created distress and panic among the ration cardholders.
The government’s continued apathy towards the migrant population living in distant places in search of jobs and sustenance has once again thrown them into the crisis with this exercise.
Also Read: It’s Not Just Food Price, India Is Facing a Food Security Challenge
One Nation One Ration Card: A Million Challenges
The first national lockdown in India because of COVID-19 witnessed one of the worst migrant exodus where millions of migrant workers working in the cities were forced to leave and walk thousands of kilometres towards their village. In one go the national lockdown led to them losing their sources of livelihood.
One of the main reasons that forced them to leave was their exclusion from the food security net at their place of work. They possessed a ration card at their origin place or home but not in the city where they worked. This created a scenario where people faced staggering food insecurity and took extreme steps.
In response to the migrant crisis and food insecurity, the government of India started the One Nation One Ration Card Scheme, which provided a facility for the ration cardholder to get foodgrains from any ration shop in the country. Since its introduction, the government has failed to implement this mobility scheme effectively.
Apart from some presence in metro cities such as Delhi and Mumbai, the poor spread of information by the government about the scheme among the migrants, supply mismanagement of the foodgrains at the ration shop, and authentication-related difficulties in accessing ration are some of the main concerns that persist in the operation of the ONORC Scheme across the country.
However, the E-KYC verification process with September 30, 2024 as a deadline to complete verification at any ration shop in the country poses a big question on the existence of the ONORC scheme. There needs to be more than oral directions about the accessibility to complete the E-KYC verification. In a practical sense, the verification at any ration shop in the country is not as comfortable as it sounds.
The ONORC is still facing difficulties in addressing the challenge of providing access to migrant beneficiaries who are not from the location which is served by the Fair Price Shop. Considering the local dynamics, the FPS dealer first prioritises to fulfil the verification of those who are the beneficiaries of that shop and not those ration cardholders who are migrants.
A migrant worker in a distant location goes through different forms of discrimination on an everyday basis and continues to lack the agency to claim their rights at their workplace. The hostile attitude at various workplace locations tends to discriminate against these migrant workers on the lines of caste, gender and linguistic identities.
Workers in a circular migration who spend a few months in cities or distant places to earn are the most vulnerable to locating and accessing the nearest ration shop to complete this process.
It has yet again exposed the fragility of the unorganised migrant workforce in the economy. The fear among the migrant population to save their monthly food grains erupted due to the ill-informed and mandatory exercise by the government.
The devastating COVID-19 national lockdown in the year 2020 has been a reminder to address the miseries of these vulnerable populations but the government of India has failed in doing so by ignoring those who are continuously on the move to survive and has further added to their problem by attacking one of the most essential safeguards for the households that is ration card.
Technology as an instrument of exclusion
During the years 2013-2020, with the help of technology-driven Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) operations, such as digitisation of ration card details, Aadhaar seeding, identification of ineligible/duplicate ration cards, etc. the States/UTs collectively have weeded out a total of about 4.39 crore ration cards.
These ration cards have been cancelled without any prior notice to the beneficiaries and no proper reason has been given even after the cancellation. While the Central Government claims that these cancelled cards were bogus, on the grounds that there are problems related to matching of biometric records even for genuine beneficiaries (biometric errors) and non-possession of Aadhar.
Non-functioning of the internet in rural and remote areas lead to significant scale cancellation of ration cards for which notices to the family concerned were not served. The starvation death of an 11-year-old Santoshi in Simdega district, Jharkhand was one such case where the family lost their ration card due to the non-fulfillment of authentication.
The ongoing E-KYC verification exercise by the government indicates that the government has not learnt its lesson. Reliance on poorly developed technology that is erratic and fails to serve the needs of millions of poor will lead to deletion of ration card holders. At a time when India is witnessing unprecedented inequality, instead of widening the welfare coverages, we are witnessing an attempt to dilute the existing structures.
Way Forward: Right to Food for all
The rigid compulsion on all ration card holders for E-KYC verification needs to be stopped immediately. Any update or improvement process in the ration card list should be inclusive and transparent and its responsibility should be given to the State Food Commission. The name of any innocent family or individual should not be removed from the ration card list on technical grounds.
Unfortunately, the Government of India’s exclusionary E-KYC verification of ration card campaign started at a time when the Supreme Court ordered all the state governments and Union Government to issue ration cards to all unorganised workers registered at the E-shram portal who do not have a ration card.
The Supreme Court took Suo Motu cognisance of ‘Problems and Miseries of Migrant Labourers’ in the year 2020 and has given important directions to ensure food security for migrant workers and unorganised sector workers to an additional 8 crore people. In this case, last year, the apex court directed the Union Government to ensure an adequate supply of food grains to cover the excluded population.
For over a year, the Supreme Court’s orders have not been implemented by any state/union territory. The implementation of the Supreme Court’s order will be important for the universalisation of the Public Distribution System. It is also crucial to expand the food basket and include dal, millets and edible oil for all ration cardholders considering the poor dietary diversity and the need to ensure the nutritional security of the majority.
(The author is an independent researcher and activist associated with the Right to Food Campaign)