Anticipating massive political dividend from the National Food Security Act (NFSA) in the 2014 general elections, the UPA government is going in a big way to put in place the administrative mechanism to roll out the legal entitlement even before the pending bill is passed by Parliament.
As part of the exercise, the Food Corporation of India (FCI) has embarked on a recruitment drive in a big way.
Sources in the government said the FCI is working out a plan to hire 11,000 new personnel and among them, hundreds would be in managerial positions. But independent experts feel that such a massive recruitment of officers and staff in FCI would further add on to the expenditure associated with the Food Bill, which in last count was estimated to push up the annual food subsidy to over `1,23,000 crore. In the 2013-14 Budget, food subsidy burden is estimated to be `90,000 crore.
In an official statement, FCI has said that the organisation, through the Staff Selection Commission (SSC), has advertised for 3,755 vacancies during 2011, out of which nearly 1,700 officials have already joined. That induction procedure is still in progress.
Another 6,545 vacancies were again advertised for which the written examination stands concluded through SSC. FCI has now advertised 460 vacancies in the managerial cadre (category II), which may be soon followed by advertising of 30 vacancies in the assistant general manager-level category-I posts.
The new appointments precede the Food Security law under which FCI will need to meet increased requirements of storage and movement of food grains for the public distribution system (PDS).
A senior FCI official said massive foodgrain procurement, besides the coming law, would require extensive food grain management in the country. “This is the reason why FCI has to go in for massive recruitment,” he said.
The Food Security Bill seeks to provide legal entitlement for cheap grains to almost 67 per cent of the Indian population. As per official estimates, after the bill is enacted, the government would need around 63 million tonnes of grains annually, which is just marginally more than the current quantity of grains, which the FCI handles currently.