Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

State decides to have two BPL categories

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The State has now decided to demarcate two categories of people among those below poverty line (BPL), ‘absolute poor’ and ‘poor’ — the former as per Central norms and the latter as per the State’s evaluations.

With the decision, the Central government seems to have succeeded in forcing the State to accept the all-India norms for poverty evaluation on the State despite its plea to consider the unique situation prevailing in the State.

“Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan and I had met the Planning Commission Vice-Chairman and even the Prime Minister on the issue. But they mercilessly rejected our pleas and said that the Central norms could not be altered for a single State,” Food and Civil Supplies Minister C. Divakaran told The Hindu on Thursday.

The Minister said that about 11.37 lakh BPL families would be included in the absolute poor category and about 9.66 lakh families in the poor category.

Only those families in the absolute poor category will be eligible for assistance under Central schemes. The State government will extend State-level schemes like education and health concessions to the second category of poor families.

The Minister said new ration cards, segregating the two categories of BPL families and APL (above poverty line) families, would be ready for distribution by month-end.

The Planning Commission has estimated that only 10.25 lakh families in the State could be categorised BPL. This will constitute only 17.78 per cent of the rural families. But as per the State’s own assessment, nearly 21.04 lakh families, that is 36.48 per cent, were poor.

This is expected to reduce significantly the Central aid to the State under various welfare schemes, besides the quantum of food grains for distribution under the targeted public distribution system.

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State decides to have two BPL categories

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