The Commissioner of Civil Supplies has asked staff manning fair price shops not to harass family cardholders coming to collect the essential commodities, especially senior citizens or people with disabilities.
He urged consumers, who are unable to go directly to the shop such as senior citizens or persons with disabilities and do not have anyone else to collect the items at home, to submit the necessary authorisation forms. The forms are available in plenty at all fair price shops.
“The authorisation from such cardholders is enough to provide the provisions without the biometric authentication,” the official said in a press release here. There have been complaints from such persons that they were being harassed by shopkeepers, he added.
Shopkeepers have been told to provide the commodities to the cardholders even if biometric authentication does not work due to network issues.
“They can do so by taking the signature of the cardholder in the register,” explained a source.
However, other consumers, who are cardholders cannot opt for this facility. They cannot authorise outsiders such as domestic workers or drivers to collect their provisions. This is not permitted under the rules. At present, there is 99% coverage of biometric authentication.
