PDS smart card switch likely in August

Details of nearly 60 lakh families have been procured from Aadhaar cards submitted by ration card holders in 13 districts including Tiruchy, Perambalur, Ariyalur, Theni, Dindigul, Virudunagar and Thoothukudi where the work on collection of details is now under way, officials said. “Work in the remaining 17 districts will be undertaken on completion of work in the 13 districts,” officials said, adding issue of smart card would start by November for the entire state. They would be issued to consumers through their local FPS (fair price shops).  

“Smart card work has been started on a trial basis in some shops in Chennai, where consumers have been asked to come to the shop with their Aadhaar card to duplicate the information in the Aadhaar card into the smart card,” officials added.  It is a huge exercise as there are over 1.98 crore ration card holders in the state. 

Ration rice and pulses are issued through 33,222 FPS including 25,049 full time and 8,173 part-time shops. There are 3,54,152 holders in North Chennai, while there are 1,77, 122 ration cards holders in South Chennai. 

With validity of current ration cards ending in December this year, officials are confident that smart card work for the entire state would be completed on time and cards issued to consumers to enable them to draw their rations through them. Once issued, the smart cards—similar to an ATM card—  will enable a consumer to know what, when and how much ration he/she has drawn and the balance of all commodities in the smart-shop. 

“This is expected to weed out illegal sales by FPS salesmen and also end smuggling of PDS rice to neighbouring states,” officials said.   “A Chennai based firm is handling the logistics for this enterprise”, officials added.