Bhubaneswar, Jan. 15: The launch of Biju Janata Dal's (BJD) awareness programme to sensitise people on the state government's success stories was postponed because of Makar Sankranti celebrations today. The awareness drive will begin tomorrow.

BJD spokesperson Pratap Kesari Deb said: "The state is in a festive mood today. We will start reaching out to panchayats, blocks and even to the constituency levels from tomorrow. The awareness programme will include several workers' conferences and continue for a month."

He said that during the month-long awareness programme, the party would take on both the Congress and the BJP. "We will tell people how the Centre has slashed grants for various government schemes," he said.

Deb added that rallies and meetings would be held across the state and the party would also address the issue of irregularities in the distribution of ration cards that was alleged by the Congress. "We will give ration cards to all eligible people. We are committed to provide subsidised food to nearly 3.83 crore people under the National Food Security Act (NFSA)," he said.

In another development, the deadline to withdraw ration cards ended today. Food and consumer welfare department sources said that 1,64,811 ration cards had so far been returned by ineligible beneficiaries. "We have already distributed 80 lakh ration cards covering 2.98 lakh people," said an official.

Another official said that they would lodge criminal cases against the ineligible beneficiaries who would try to use the ration cards to get subsidised food.

"Police will lodge cases under various sections of the Indian Penal Code relating to forgery and providing false information," said an official, adding that market cost of the food grains taken by such beneficiaries would be recovered from them with 10 per cent interest.

If government officials are found to have obtained subsidised food grains using the ration cards, both criminal and departmental proceedings would be initiated against them.