Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh said that Himachal Government had started the process for formulating action plan to implement the National Food Security Ordinance (NFSO) in letter and spirit. He was addressing the Chief Ministers Conference of Congress ruled States on NFSO at New Delhi today.He said that State Government would ensure to meet the nutritional standards fixed under the ordinance relating to cooked meals for children in Anganwadi Centres and Mid Day Meal Scheme being implemented in government schools. He said that provision of free meals during pregnancy and lactation period along with maternity benefits of Rs. 6000 would ensure safe deliveries and would reduce the infant and maternal mortality rate in the state.
Shri Virbhadra Singh said that State Government was providing food grains and pulses at subsidized rates to all the ration card holders in the State under Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS). He said that ordinance may exclude about 18.85 lakh persons from TPDS and also reduce monthly allocation by 17094 MT of food grains to the state. He said that State Government would continue to provide food grains to all families irrespective of fact that whether they were covered under the ambit of the ordinance or not. He requested the Central Government to provide food grains (wheat and rice) at the current level of 43,995 MT per month.Chief Minister said that BPL families in the State were currently getting 20 kgs of wheat and 15 kg of rice per month irrespective of family size. He said that State Government would maintain present level of scale to these families and requested the Union Government to allocate food grains at BPL price at existing level of allocations.