Dec 12, 2012 | Age Correspondent | Mumbai
The Bombay high court on Tuesday suggested the state to link the Aadhar card of each individual to the ration card in order to eliminate the issue of bogus and duplicate ration cards. Observing that the government is short of staff and vision, the court once again pulled up the state authorities for their inaction on the issue.
The court was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Pune-based activist Jayprakash Unecha in 2010 alleging that hundreds of bogus and duplicate ration cards were in existence in Pune and other parts of the state.
In a previous hearing, the court had asked the Maharashtra government to give a district-wise break-up of fake ration cards in the entire state. The state on Tuesday filed an affidavit claiming that it had arrested 276 government officials for issuing fake ration cards and 36 civilians for using such cards between the years 2005 and 2012.
A division bench of Justice A.M. Khanwilkar and Justice R.D. Dhanuka questioned the state as to why the government had not thought of a method to stop the issuance of fake ration cards. “Will it not be a prudent approach in the matter to make it compulsory to produce the Aadhar card for the issuance of a new ration card? Why is the government not considering this? Unless you put a verification process in place, you cannot track the duplicate or bogus ration cards,” said the division bench.
When public prosecutor Aruna Pai, appearing on behalf of the state, said that the government is short-staffed and also has the burden of the LPG scheme, the court observed that the government is not only short-staffed, but also short of vision. “Link everything to the Aadhar card and make one team to run it. No great changes need to be made, the state will have to only link the card to the other via a software,” remarked the court.
Ms Pai then informed court that the state is considering the approach. The court directed the state to inform the court within one week whether it will accept the approach and make the required changes.