Tamil Nadu CM says replacing the subsidy with a direct cash transfer is not appropriate
Chennai: Tamil Nadu chief minister J. Jayalalithaa has urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to re-think the roll-out of the second phase of its direct cash transfer scheme for cooking gas cylinders, known as direct benefit transfer for LPG (DBTL).
In a letter to Singh, the Tamil Nadu chief minister said she was “rudely shocked” to receive a letter from the oil minister informing her of the second phase of the scheme.
The programme is proposed to be implemented in 235 districts across the country, including 25 districts in Tamil Nadu, from 1 January.
“I would like to place on record my strong opposition to the proposed roll-out of direct benefit transfer for LPG,” she said, adding that replacing the subsidy with a direct cash transfer is not appropriate.
Jayalalithaa had already conveyed her opposition to direct cash transfers to beneficiaries’ bank accounts by the central government, saying it was wrong administrative practice to bypass state governments.
Further, she said linking DBTL with Aadhaar identity numbers will only lead to confusion and public inconvenience as the system is not yet fully geared for it. In Tamil Nadu, of the eligible 67.4 million people, Aadhaar numbers have been issued to only 25.2 million.
The DBTL scheme has so far been introduced in 54 districts, covering 21.9 million out of India’s total of about 140 million consumers of subsidized cooking gas cylinders.