India achieves another milestone with ‘One Nation One Ration Card’ now fully portable

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Now ‘One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC)’ is effectively implemented in all 36 states and union territories, making food security portable throughout the country. Assam became the last state to have it implemented. ONORC scheme was primarily created in 2019 to provide food safety to migrant families, however it has had a very positive impact even on non-migrants households also, offering them more choices and flexibility to choose the Fair Price Shop (FPS) of their choice to get their ration from.

ONORC is a part of PDS

ONORC forms a key part of the India’s Public Distribution System (PDS). The vigorous drive launched by the government to make people aware of the portability and their right to rations, has bore fruition as majority of the households now know even about the inter-state portability.

Food is received from any Fair Price Shop

Under ONORC, families receive subsidised food grain from any ‘Fair Price Shop’ in the country, immensely benefitting migrants staying in different parts of the country. With the ONORC, all the beneficiaries in one state can get the same fair rations in other states also.

ONORC helps significantly during Covid-19

ONORC plan has significantly contributed in ensuring subsidized foodgrains to National Food Security Act (NFSA) beneficiaries, especially migrant beneficiaries during the last two years of Covid-19 pandemic. This citizen centric initiative has been implemented in a short-span of time covering about 80 crore beneficiaries, after being initiated in August 2019.

ONORC empowers NFSA beneficiaries

The objective of this beneficiary centric high-impact program is to empower all National Food Security Act beneficiaries to become AtmaNirbhar for their food security anywhere in the country, through portability of their existing ration cards enabling them to seamlessly lift their entitled subsidized foodgrains in part or full from any Fair Price Shop of their choice. This also enables their family members to lift balance or required amount of foodgrains on the same ration card at their native or any place from the FPS of their choice.

71 crore portable transactions

Since its inception in August 2019, about 71 crore portable transactions (43.6 crore NFSA and 27.8 crore PM-GKAY transactions) have taken place under ONORC, delivering foodgrains equivalent to about Rs. 40,000 crore in food subsidy through portability.

64 crore portable transactions during pandemic

About 64 crore portable transactions have been recorded during COVID-19 period itself starting from April 2020 till date, delivering foodgrains equivalent to about Rs. 36,000 crore in food subsidy through portability. Out of these 64 crore portable transactions, 27.8 crore portability transactions were recorded under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY), which was announced in March 2020 for distribution of additional free-of-cost foodgrains like rice and wheat to NFSA beneficiaries to mitigate the Covid induced hardships.

Average around 3 crore monthy portable transactions

Presently a monthly average of about 3 crore portable transactions are being recorded, delivering the subsidised NFSA and free PMGKAY foodgrains with anywhere flexibility to the beneficiaries.

‘MERA RATION’ mobile application

‘MERA RATION’ mobile application is another dimension under ONORC plan, which has been rolled out to take maximum advantage of the ONORC plan. The mobile app is providing a host of useful real time information to the beneficiaries and is available in 13 languages. So far, the App has been downloaded more than 20 Lakh times from Google play store.