Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has extended the deadline for e-KYC (know your customer) verification till December 31 for the convenience of beneficiaries of the Public Distribution System (PDS), Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister Krushna Chandra Patra informed on Wednesday.
In a written statement to the House, he said that e-KYC of 96 per cent (3.12 crore of 3.26 crore) beneficiaries have so far been verified under the drive, which was launched by the state government after the BJP came to power 17 months back to ensure transparency in ration distribution.
He informed that e-KYC verification of 14.38 lakh, including children below 5 years and elderly people, is still pending. “For children below 5 years, field staff have been advised to inform the heads of families to enrol them using a child Aadhaar card so that the reference number can be recorded in the database for future e-KYC. For elderly beneficiaries, field staff have been asked to reach out to them at their doorsteps and complete their e-KYC verification,” Patra said.
Odisha has a total of 3.28 crore beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) and over 6.48 lakh under the State Food Security Scheme (SFSS).
The Minister clarified that no beneficiary has so far been deleted from the public distribution system (PDS) due to lack of e-KYC.
However, over 6.93 lakh ghost cards were detected and cancelled till November 26 amid intensified efforts to weed out ineligible beneficiaries from the system. Besides, 33,128 ineligible families, comprising 1.20 lakh people, were identified during the verification drive and their ration cards were cancelled, he added.
