Ration Kadai

Last week I happened to go to my ration shop and buy things for that month. It has been a really really long gap ever since I last visited the ration shop. College sernthathuku aprom ration kadai pakkam porathu suthama koranji poyidichi...

Cinema la kamikira mathiri ration kadainaa oru periya queue.... thillu mullu panra kadai karanga... kerosene drum and poor quality rice ithellam has set a bad impression about the so called "fair price shops"

Oru arisi kadaila poyi oru kilo pacha arisi vaanganumnaa.. it will cost you some where between Rs 18 - 22 whereas you get the same kind of rice for Rs 2. Imagine you get 10 kilos of Rice for the money you would spend on buying one kilo of rice in any normal super market.

Quality? no it is not at all bad, if its bad then why would you hear so much of smuggling

happening at these shops.

Accuracy? - Nalla poyi paarungaiyaa nowadays they use, electronic weighing machines. Kallula magent veikrathu... kerosene canla kattai adikara kaalam ella pochu

Availability? - Yes i mentioned that there is lot of "behind the scenes" happening at these shops but why does that occur on first place. Its because of people like you and me who has the ration card and who have been using it for a long time have stopped using the same.

Govt supplies the necessary commodities to any shop based on the number of cards available to that ward. Assuming on an average a fair price shop at Chennai can 800 cards, this quantity of rice, sugar, wheat, oil will be dispatched. When the consumption is less by the public, the shop keeper tries to sell the same rice for 4 Rupees to 8 Rupees to a vendor and makes black profit out of it. Ok now who is affected because of this.... a maid/ servant who is regular to these shops some times return back with empty bags saying that all the products are sold out. They dont have the adequate information to escalate this issue to the senior authorities. Whereas educated people just refrain from going to ration shops because its not something they would desire to go.

This post is mainly to create awareness amongst all of us that we do have some good schemes by the government and we educated people should spread these and also take necessary actions by filing consumer complaints when we come across illegal practices happening near us.

Some interesting news - Take a look at your family ration card today and you will find all the escalation details like phone number, email address? :-) yes email address available in them.
Cost of commodities in govt fair price shop
Rice - Rs 2 (Max 20 Kg per card)
Sugar - Rs 13.50 ( Maximum 2 Kg per card)
Wheat - Rs 7.50 (Max 5 - 10kg per card)
Kerosene - Rs 9 per litre (NO LPG Connection 10 litres, One cylinder - 3 litres)

How to file a complaint? - Login to http://www.consumer.tn.gov.in/ . Register a complaint
If the link doesnt work, check CORE - They equally address many consumer level issues.
If you want to meet some people in your locality rather than making an online petition
Check this out http://www.consumer.tn.gov.in/vol_orgn.htm

And now there is one more major topic of dicsussion, do people who belong to above poverty line need to still buy rice for Rs 2. Is this not intended for people who are below poverty line?

Yes you are right! Know what govt has already started to look on this issue and they are coming up with a differential price plan for people who are above proverty and below poverty. And they are also going to come up with a subsidy on petroleum products.
Check this out! http://www.hindu.com/2007/11/12/stories/2007111250781500.htm
Finally ration card has become mandatory to many of the things like gas connection, address proof. But lets not stop with just that. We do all the time complaint about inflation and rising prices but never take a look at what is already been provided to us.