What is Ration Mitra yojana

 Governance 

What is Ration Mitra Yojana?

The Centre has launched a common facility to register names in ration cards on a pilot basis for 11 States and Union Territories. 

Ration Mitra

Ration Mitra' Portal aims to enable these States to identify and verify the eligible beneficiaries for coverage under the National Food Security Act.

Named as Ration Mitr, this software developed by the National Informatics Centre can be used to enrol people of any State.

The portal is an enabler for States/UTs to complete their inclusion exercise under NFSA.

The NFSA provides food security coverage for 81.35 crore persons in the country. The present NFSA coverage is about 79.74 crore.

Ration Mitra Yojana 

About National Food Security (NFS) Act

The NFS Act, 2013 aims to provide subsidized food grains to approximately two-thirds of India's 1.2 billion people.

It converts into legal entitlements for existing food security programs of the GoI.

It includes the Midday Meal Scheme, Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) scheme and the Public Distribution System (PDS).

Further, the NFSA 2013 recognizes maternity entitlements.

The Midday Meal Scheme and the ICDS are universal in nature whereas the PDS will reach about two-thirds of the population (75% in rural areas and 50% in urban areas).

Pregnant women, lactating mothers, and certain categories of children are eligible for daily free cereals.

Key provisions of NFSA

The NFSA provides a legal right to persons belonging to "eligible households" to receive foodgrains at a subsidised price.

It includes rice at Rs 3/kg, wheat at Rs 2/kg and coarse grain at Rs 1/kg under the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS). These are called central issue prices (CIPs)