Bhubaneswar, Jan. 13: To improve the public distribution system (PDS), the Orissa government has decided to do away with the storage-agent system April 1, which is observed as Utkal Divas.

“The storage-system will cease to exist. We will instead develop a new mechanism to supply food grains to retail points,” said minister of food supplies and consumer welfare Sarada Nayak, after attending a high-level meeting chaired by chief minister Naveen Patnaik at the state secretariat today.

Officials said the government decided to abolish the storage-agent system following recommendations of the Justice D.P. Wadhwa committee for simplifying and restructuring the PDS.

With the abolition of the storage-agent system, 863 storage agents across the state will have to hand over food grains in their possession to the state-run Orissa Civil Supply Corporation.

From April 1, the supply corporation will run the distribution system and ensure that essential items reach block headquarters and panchayats on time.

The government will constitute a committee under the chief secretary to formalise this mechanism.

Sources said the corporation would set up stocking centres in all the 314 blocks of the state and appoint people to handle them. The Orissa government has already contacted the National Informatics Centre for computerisation of all the stocking centres. “All these centres will operated in the e-governance mode to ensure transparency,” said Nayak.

Officials said the government plans to spend Rs 336 crore to bring about necessary reforms in the PDS. “We have already detected nearly 1 lakh ghosts cards against which rice was earlier being released.

This was causing huge losses to the state exchequer. Such irregularities can be stopped with the abolition of the storage-agent system,” an official said.

At present the government provides 25 kg and 35 kg of rice at Rs 2 per kg to people living below the poverty line incurring an expenditure of nearly Rs 866 crore.

The government also plans to set up model fair price shops in over 6,000 gram panchayats. “The corporation will also be asked to use mobile vans to provide essential items under PDS to people in tribal-dominated areas,” the minister said.

The state government has already issued biometric cards to beneficiaries in the tribal-dominated Rayagada district to promote transparency. The cards, which store the fingerprint and iris images of the beneficiaries, rule out chances of duplicity and corruption.