Editorial
An important food security initiative being derailed
Many deserving ones seem left out
THE way the current vulnerable group feeding programme is being handled speaks of the very slipshod manner in which an important social safety net initiative has been embarked upon. Not only are the genuinely needy deprived, some of the allotted quantity of food grains is also ending up with the local influential ruling party men.
The matter assumes an even more grotesque character when a praiseworthy programme of reaching one lakh metric tonnes of food grain to one million of the abject poor, to ameliorate their conditions in the holy month of Ramadan, is being virtually subverted. In one upazilla for example, reportedly, the chairman was forced by the local AL leaders to allot them as much as 50 percent of the quota allocated for the seven unions of his area.
The situation as it stands now is that many to whom the VGF card has been allotted on political considerations do not fall in the category of the needy.
The programme in some places have been affected by inter party clashes and in one place the rush to monopolise VGF cards by the AL and JP respectively has resulted in the suspension of the operation.
It is a matter of concern too that the recipients, are not being given the amount of rice that is due to them, and some of the chairmen are resorting to various dubious methods to deprive the poor. That the rice meant for the poor are ending up elsewhere is borne out by the fact that police recovered 320 bags of rice, allegedly misappropriated by the local AL secretary of Nilphamari sadar thana, from his house last Thursday.
Those for whom the feeding programme is actually meant should not be seen through the prism of any particular party; and to monopolise the allotment of VGF cards and distribution list, on unalloyed partisan considerations, is not only abhorrent it also belies the government's much vaunted commitment to establish social and economic justice.
We suggest that the government conduct a wholesale review of the VGF operation so far, scrutinise the list of recipients objectively and correct the distortions. We also call upon the government to come down heavily on those that have damaged the VGF programme. Anyone found misappropriating food grains from the VGF quota must be made an example of. And this requires an oversight mechanism of the government to be put in place immediately.
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