Overall Best Project : Government of Chhattisgarh : Computerization of Paddy Procurement and Public Distribution System

Ram Prasad, a small paddy farmer who lives 22 Kms from Raipur, the captial of

Chhatisgarh, is now a happy man. Earlier, he had to travel 22 kms to the nearest

mandi to sell his paddy produce. Traveling so much distance meant that the whole

day was gone, and a lot of money spent on transporting his crops. On top of

that, the mandi decided the price for his goods, and even the payment was not

made immediately. Now, things have changed dramatically after the Govt. of

Chhatisgarh computerized its paddy procurement and distribution system. He now

sells his paddy to the govt's Procurement Center, which is just 3-Km from his

village. This not only saves him transportation time and cost, but he even gets

his payment on the spot by cheque.

Vivek Dhand Principal Secretary (Food) QWhat has been the impact of this project? All concerned officials can now track procurement of paddy. They can now know how much paddy is being sold by a particular farmer. On the other hand, farmers get their cheques as soon as they sell paddy which earlier used to take several days. Now data is counter checked to ensure every process is followed in proper manner. QWhat was the biggest challenge while implementing this project ? Computerizing and connecting 1577 procurement centers that includes centers situated in deep interiors was the biggest challenge. People are now surprised to find computers in rustic and dusty procurement centers which earlier was hard to imagine. Centers where Internet connectivity is not possible are connected via 'Runners' which is quite innovative and at the same time difficult to implement. QWhat kinds of benefits do you see resulting from this project ? Farmers are now aware of their rights, therefore no one can cheat them. On top of that, the total cost of software used in implementing this project is quite meager as compared to its huge impact. This e Governance application has been able to ensure that crores of rupees does not get diverted to other sources.

This is only one side of the story. The other side is that the Govt. of

Chhatisgarh buys paddy from 7.5 Lakh farmers like Ram Prasad, converts it into

rice through millers, and then sells the same in Govt owned Fair Price Shops to

BPL (below poverty line) families across the state. Since Ram Prasad himself

belongs to a BPL family, he gets benefited here as well. He can now buy rice at

Rs 2 per Kg from the Fair Price Shops, along with 37 Lakh other BPL families.

All these changes to his life were made possible by effective usage of

technology.

This project was conceptualized and initiated two years ago by Dr. Alok

Shukla, then Secretery (Food) and Gaurav Dwivedi, then MD of MARKFED & CGSCSC.

Under this project, the Govt. of Chhatisgarh has computerized the entire process

of paddy procurement and public distribution. This includes paddy procurement

from farmers, its storage, milling and finally the distribution of rice and

other commodities to 37 Lakh ration card holders through Fair Price Shops. To

accomplish this task, the govt. computerized 1577 paddy procurement centers, 52

storage centers, all district offices concerned, 99 Civil Supplies corporation

distribution centers and 35 FCI rice receiving centers. This covers six

different organizations involved in food grain management, namely This Dept of

Food, Marketing Federation (MARKFED), CG State Civil Supplies Corporation (CGSCSC),

Food Corporation of India (FCI), Central Cooperative Bank and Primary

Agricultural Cooperative Societies(PACS).

Besides bringing transparency into the entire system, the govt. has also

taken several other steps to monitor and ensure that the system actually works.

Paddy Procurement and Milling



The paddy purchase centres are mainly located at village panchayat level. The
computers that have been deployed in these centers have been loaded with a form

based stand alone application (called PACS), which facilitates the purchase of

paddy, and issuing it to millers, storage centres and FCI. When farmers submit

their paddy here, they're issued a printed receipt, cheque payment, and delivery

memo all on the spot. Each of the 1577 centers have a data entry operator, who

is local to the society, and has been trained to operate the PACS module. All

data from the PACS application in each center is uploaded to a central

application hosted at NIC, Raipur. Some of the centers have VSAT connectivity

for instant uploading of this data. The centers that don't have connectivity,

have been equipped with motorcycle riders. There are about 300 such riders who

carry the data in encrypted USB drives to the nearest Internet point, which is

usually one of the Janpad Panchayats. These offices are equipped with V-Sat

based connectivity. Similarly any new version of software and delivery order

details are downloaded from the server by these motorcycle riders, and carried

back to the procurement centres.

All operations carried out by the district level offices such as collector's

office, DMO of MARKFED and DM of CGSCSC as well as headquarters are computerized

through web based applications. Two computers each were installed at all the 52

storage centres of MARKFED, with a form based module to receive and issue paddy.

70 Custom Milled Rice (CMR) receiving centres of CGSCSC and 35 CMR receiving

centres of FCI are using a web module to generate sample slips, analysis report

and acknowledgment report.

We wanted to use technology to reduce the diversion and reduce the time taken for different processes. Towards this end, we worked an online model wherein all operations involved in food grain supply chain are done on computers. We received hundred percent commitment and support from users in this project.

Manoj Kumar Mishra, State Informatics Officer, NIC, Chhattisgarh

Unified Ration Card Database and issue of PDS commodities to FPS



A unified ration card database has now been prepared and ration cards are
printed from it. Only those ration cards having a unique number and a barcode

are now valid in Chhattisgarh. Due to this, 2.25 Lakh fake ration cards have

been eliminated. Plus, shop-wise quota allocation of govt. subsidized goods has

now been automated. Per card allocations are fed into the computer at state

level. Shop-wise allocations are calculated by the software. All Fair Price

Shops are required to give declaration of their stocks and sales in the previous

month before issue of fresh PDS commodities. These figures are entered in the

web application at CGSCSC warehouses. Based on allocation, stock and sales

figures of FPS, the actual amount of PDS commodities to be issued to FPS is

calculated by the software, and a delivery order is issued on the web

application. After the issue of delivery order, a truck challan is issued

indicating the truck number, driver's name, quantity dispatched, etc. The truck

challan is also generated using the web application.

I have doubts whether technology can really reduce corruption or not. But I am sure transparency checks corruption. Hence technology can be used to reduce corruption in the delivery mechanism. This project is an example of how technology can be used to reduce corruption in the government.

A.K.Somasekhar, Principal Systems Analyst, NIC, Chhattisgarh

Website for Citizen Participation



This web site allows citizens to monitor the public distribution system.
Citizens can register their e-mail ids or mobile numbers on this web-site to

participate. Whenever PDS commodities are despatched to a FPS from the

warehouse, an e-mail or SMS is sent to all the registered e-mail Ids and mobile

numbers. This message carries truck number, quantity of PDS commodities being

sent, the date and time of despatch. Citizens participating in this monitoring

can then check whether the truck arrived at the FPS with full quantity. If it

doesn't, or there's variation in the quantity of goods, they can lodge a

complaint at a call centre setup by the govt as well.

Call centre and Complaint Monitoring System



A call centre with a toll free number 1-800-233-3663 has also been made
operational by the Govt of Chhatisgarh. The complaints received by this call

centre are immediately entered in the system and a complaint number is given to

the complainer. Plus, complaints can also be registered via the Internet. All

the combined complaints are sent to the concerned district officer. This officer

has to submit a report on the action taken on these complaints. The status of

complaints is also informed to the complainer on demand. The complaint redressal

system is monitored at directorate and secretariat level for their speedy

disposal.

This has brought a lot of transparency in the system. Moreover, due to this,

the Central Cooperative Bank of Chhatisgarh was able to recover Rs 400 Cr from

farmers on the loans they took for growing paddy.