Setback for Mamata as Calcutta HC asks Bengal govt to stop Duare Ration scheme
India Today
The Calcutta High Court has asked the West Bengal government to end its Duare Ration scheme, which provided rations at the doorstep of the people.
In a big blow to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, the Calcutta High Court on Wednesday ordered to stop her government's Duare Ration scheme.
"In view of our discussion supra we are constrained to hold, in fine, that Duare Ration Scheme is ultra vires the National Food Security Act, 2013 and is therefore a nullity in the eye of law," the high court said in its order.
The scheme, launched in November 2021, was part of the Trinamool Congress's election manifesto in the West Bengal Assembly election last year.
The order also mentioned that if the NFS Act is amended by the Parliament for doorstep delivery of food grains, only then such a state can bring such a scheme.
Just after the implementation of the election manifesto by TMC government, a petition was filed against the Duare Ration scheme at Calcutta High Court in 2021, terming it to be illegal. However, a single bench had found nothing to be illegal in the scheme and let it continue. The order was challenged.
Under the scheme, vehicles carrying rations reach people’s neighbourhoods and are stationed 500 metres from their residences. The people could collect their rations from these vehicles.
The scheme, according to the TMC, was launched to curb corruption in the distribution of rations at the grassroots level.
