Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal today appealed to the Congress led UPA government to stop “politics of hunger” and control food inflation first even as she said the centre could learn from Punjab’s “Atta Daal” scheme which took care of the
nutritional requirement of the people by providing pulses along with wheat to more than 15 lakh families.Speaking on the Food Security Bill in the Lok Sabha today, the Bathinda mp said the UPA government should concentrate on national building by spending the same amount of money on imparting skill development.
In a bold speech in which she took the UPA government head on for failing the country on all fronts, Ms Harsimrat Badal said the food security bill was a desperate attempt to win votes by a beleaguered government which was already mired in corruption. She said in coming days inflation was likely to increase and the country’s foreign ratings could even be downgraded to “junk status”. She said in such a situation forget foreigners even Indians would not invest in the country.
Shredding the very logic of the bill one by one, the Bathinda mp asked how the centre could justify a bill that did not provide any proteins or vitamins. She also asked on what grounds had the UPA calculated that an adult required Rs 5 kilograms of wheat or rice per month when the WHO and the Indian Council for Medical Research had pegged this requirement between 10 to 14 kg per month. Speaking about the logic that the bill would make prices affordable, she said this was the biggest joke as onions were selling for Rs 80 per kg and pulses for Rs 100 per kg. “Is this government now preparing 70 per cent of the nation to survive on its dole of a few dry rotis because they have lost all control over spiralling prices of all edible items? Or is this sham of a Food Security Bill nothing but an eyewash to garner Vote Security for this failed Congress Government on the eve of elections?, the Bathinda mp asked.
Ms Badal said in direct contrast the SAD-BJP government had on attaining power in 2007 launched the Atta Daal scheme which provided 25 kgs of wheat and 2.5 kg of pulses at subsidised rates. She said the scheme had performed so successfully that it had been copied by Haryana last week which had renamed it as “Daal Roti” scheme. The mp said the scheme had even resulted in lowering of the poverty figures fron 20.9 per cent in 2005 to 8.26 per cent in 2012 according to Planning Commission figures.Ms Harsimrat Badal even challenged the Union government to prove its honesty if any by supporting her amendment to provide pulses as well as flour under the central scheme. “If you do not do this your lies about nutritional security will stand exposed, for the poll gimmick they are”, she added.
The Bathinda mp also pointed out that the highly subsized flour rate would take away all incentives of small and marginal farmers to grow food thus leading to lowered production, higher consumption and therefore further food inflation. She also called for deleting Clause 8 of the Bill which provides for Food Security Allowance. She said this if implemented would deal a death blow to the Public Distribution System (PDS).