Keen on a holistic approach on food security issues, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council will meet on Monday to discuss proposals from a working group on the right to food Bill that it would recommend to the govt.The framework, proposed by the NAC's working group headed by human rights activist Harsh Mander, presents "a set of scenarios" for food security, a key promise of the UPA prior to it returning to power last year.
NAC is expected to consider this framework, which focuses on addressing nutritional needs of those families below poverty line, suggesting their entitlements through Public Distribution System (PDS), including comprehensive nutrition support schemes for all vulnerable sections such as children and women.
The NAC, which is mulling creating an overarching authority to monitor actions taken by the states to control communal violence in their regions, will take up another bill in this regard for consideration once again.
In its last meeting on 14th July the NAC had recommended distribution of subsidised food grains to everyone in at least 200 most disadvantaged districts across the country by April next year.
Asserting itself on the vexed issue, the NAC had, after a marathon day-long meeting, also suggested gradual expansion of universal public distribution system to other blocks but with a caveat of differential pricing.
It suggested that people living in the poorest of the poor districts or blocks, which include Naxal-affected areas, should get 35 kg of food grains -- rice, wheat, millets and pulses -- at a subsidised rate of Rs three per kg.