Supreme Court asks Centre to focus on employment generation, more than providing free ration

The Supreme Court on Monday (December 9), while hearing the matter pertaining to providing food under the Food Security Act, called on the Centre to focus on employment generation instead of only providing free ration to poor people.

The top court said that if the ongoing practice of providing ration at such a large level continues, the state governments may keep on issuing ration cards to appease the people, since they know that the liability to provide the grains rests with the Centre.

“If the states were asked to provide free ration, many of them would say they cannot, citing financial crunch, and hence the focus should be on generating more employment,” the court observed.

The court also questioned whether the states should be made to pay for the ration if they keep on issuing ration cards.

The Centre’s counsel, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, apprised the court that the government provides free ration in the form of wheat and rice among other essential commodities to 80 crore poor people under the National Food Security Act 2013. However, petitioner Advocate Prashant Bhushan contended that, despite that, around 2 to 3 crore people have still been left from the scheme.

The court was considering a plea highlighting the problems and the plight of migrant workers, where it had earlier directed that those eligible and entitled for ration cards/food grains under the NFSA and have been identified as such by the respective states/Union Territories, must be issued ration cards before November 19, 2024.

There was a heated exchange between SG Mehta and petitioner Bhushan during the court proceedings on Monday.

While pointing out that the case was initiated by the Supreme Court back in 2020 due to the Covid pandemic, the Solicitor General remarked that Bhushan was trying to run the government and frame policies himself.

At this, Bhushan replied by saying that the Centre’s counsel was making such comments against him since he had once revealed some emails against the SG, which were very damaging for his image.

Thereafter, the court deferred the matter for the next hearing on January 8, 2025.