Bhubaneswar, July 19: Union minister of state for food and public distribution K.V. Thomas today sought the BJD government’s support for food security bill by asserting that Odisha would gain more from the new law.

Thomas, who was on a day-long visit to Odisha, today called on chief minister Naveen Patnaik, seeking his party’s support for the bill in Parliament.

He sought to allay the state government’s apprehensions that its quota of rice through the public distribution system (PDS) would be reduced if the ordinance pertaining to the bill became a law. “I have requested the chief minister to support the bill,” Thomas said. Before his meeting with Thomas, Naveen had, however, said that the new law would work against Odisha’s interests as it would lead to reduction of PDS rice allocation to the state.

Talking to reporters, the central minister said according to the new law, Odisha’s 79.04 per cent population in the rural areas would be covered under the targeted PDS as against the national average of 75 per cent. Similarly, Odisha’s 56.11 per cent people living in the urban areas would benefit from the scheme as against the national average of 50 per cent. Besides, Odisha would continue to get special allocation of food grains for its 10 backward districts. “The state stands to gain more,” he said.

He said the Centre was supplying 35kg of rice per family, but Odisha was providing only 25kg on the ground that the Centre was allocating rice for lesser number of families in the state. He refuted the Odisha government’s allegation and said the state had failed to lift the rice quota allocated by the Centre in the past three years.

During 2010-11, while the Centre had allocated 22.21 lakh metric tonnes of rice for Odisha, it had lifted only 20.52 lakh metric tonnes. The rice off take by Odisha was 97.1 per cent and 96.6 per cent of the central allocation during 2011-12 and 2012-13, respectively.

The off-take under the additional allocation for backward districts and additional BPL allocation was also low. During 2011-12, the Odisha government lifted 99.84 per cent of the additional central allocation for such districts, while it was a meagre 54.85 per cent in 2012-13. Under additional BPL allocation, the figure stands at 59.81 per cent and 76.16 per cent during 2011-12 and 2012-13, respectively, he said.

At a function in Jatni, Naveen earlier during the day had said that under the new law, the overall rice allotment to Odisha would decrease from 1,82,000 metric tonnes per month to 1,70,000 tonnes. “This is a reduction of 1,12,000 metric tonnes per month. This will have a serious impact,” he said.

Naveen said the bill was meant for individual entitlement while the Odisha government was following a system of family entitlement.

“The allocation of 5kg food grains per person per month will have an adverse impact on the household food security of small families and old people living alone,” he said.

A poor family is getting 25kg rice a month. But after implementation of the bill, they may get 10kg or 15kg rice a month, said Naveen.

“The new law makes no mention of special groups such as Annapurna beneficiaries, emergency feeding and rice to SC and ST hostels,” he said.