Manmohan Singh finds flaws in direct cash sop
New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday acknowledged that the UPA’s ambitious Direct Benefits Transfer subsidy scheme has “run into difficulties”.
He said this even as the government decided to extend it to 78 more districts in July and expand the ambit to include LPG subsidy in a phased manner to cover 20 districts by May 15 and more districts along with the expansion of Aadhaar enrolment. The PM, however, insisted efforts must be made to ensure the programme doesn’t fail.
As the scheme rolls out, the subsidy amount will be transferred directly to consumers’ bank accounts. Once this starts happening, there’ll only be one price at which LPG cylinders will be sold at a dealer’s shop. This will eliminate all ghost connections and diversion of cylinders, a statement said, adding that the scheme will be ex-panded to include post of-fices from October 1, 2013.
Dr Singh said the implementation of the scheme exposed “the unsatisfactory nature of tracking and monitoring systems”.
PM pins hopes on direct benefits plan
Reviewing the progress of UPA’s ambitious Direct Benefits Transfer (DBT) subsidy scheme, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said, “We have come some distance since DBT programme was rolled out in January. In this period, we have resolved a number of operational issues.
I am encouraged to see the progress and hopeful about the future. But we have also run into difficulties that we had not anticipated when we began the programme. So, we must renew our efforts for successful implementation of the programme.”
Dr Singh said its implementation has “revealed the unsatisfactory nature of tracking and monitoring systems we have in various departments.” He said India needs to show strong resolve on DBT as it cannot afford to fail now.
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