The ration card is a distant dream for many in the heart of the state capital though the district supply officer claims to have distributed 4.5 lakh of them across Ranchi district.

In a poll-bound state where alleged hunger deaths, since 11-year-old Simdega girl Santoshi’s in September 2017, have sparked national outrage, with food activists blaming the failure of the public distribution system, a ration card or the lack of it can be an indicator of governance, good or bad.

The Telegraph on Thursday went to Dhipra Mohalla, a slum within the campus of old Birsa Munda Central Jail in ward 18 of Ranchi Municipal Corporation, barely 1km from the district collectorate and sitting MLA and urban development minister C.P. Singh’s house to find many families did not have ration cards.

Of the 40-odd families in Dhipra Mohalla, which falls under Ranchi Assembly constituency, at least eight did not have ration cards, a dipstick survey by The Telegraph suggested. Giving a direct challenge to sitting MLA Singh in the Assembly seat is the JMM’s Mahua Maji, a well-known Hindi author and former state women’s commission chairperson.

Dhipra Mohalla homemaker Kiran Devi, who resides in a thatched-roof house with her husband, daughter and son, said she applied for a ration card four months ago by going to the common service centre at Ranchi Municipal Corporation office building at Kutchery.

“So far, I have not received a card. Last month, when I visited the office of the district supply office, I was told to come after the election. But without a ration card I can’t get subsidised food grains,” she said.

Phuchua and his wife Somari Devi outside their hut Picture by Manob Chowdhary

A daily-wage labourer, Krishna Khalkho, echoed the same. “I applied for the ration card six months ago but am still waiting. Whenever I go to supply office I am asked to come next week. Sometimes the clerk says there is a network problem and sometimes I get to hear that cards have exhausted,” Khalkho said.

An elderly couple, Phuchua and Somari Devi, sitting under a tree outside their hut, supported Khalkho and Kiran.

“A ration card is still a distant dream for us though I have heard big people say that getting it is not a problem anymore. I applied for the card six months ago and we are waiting,” Somari Devi said.

At least four more people said they did not have ration cards.

Contacted, ward councillor Asha Devi admitted some people did not have ration cards. “After verification, I recommended ration cards to many people in the locality. Many have received it, a few people have not. I will have to look into why they did not get it,” the councillor said.

District supply officer Neeraj Kumar Singh said “very, very few people” did not have ration cards in Ranchi. “We have issued 4.5 lakh ration cards across the district. We have very limited applications for processing (pending ration cards) and those will be done after the election,” Singh said.

But why would some people be left out of the loop? Singh claimed issuing ration cards was a continuous process. “When old applications are cleared, new ones come. This is the reason one find someone without a ration card in a locality where many others have their cards,” he said.