The Union Cabinet on March 26 extended the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana for another six months, i.e. till September 2022. Earlier, the PM-GKAY was to end in March 2022.
Till now the government has spent approximately Rs 2.60 lakh crore on PM-GKAY and will spend around Rs 80,000 crore in the next six months.
"The Government has spent approximately Rs 2.60 Lakh Crore so far and another Rs. 80,000 Crore will be spent over the next 6 months till September 2022 taking the total expenditure under PM-
GKAY to nearly Rs 3.40 Lakh Crore," the government said in a press release.
The Phase-V of PM-GKAY will now cover nearly 80 crore beneficiaries across India.
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With the extension of the scheme, the government is aiming to ensure that no poor household goes to bed without food during this time of COVID-19 pandemic recovery.
The government would provide an additional 5 kg free ration per person per month in addition to his normal quota of foodgrains under the NFSA. Until Phase-V of the PM-GKAY, the government had allocated about 759 LMT of free foodgrains and will allocate another 244 LMT of free foodgrains in the next six months. With this, the total allocation of free foodgrains under the PM-GKAY now stands at 1,003 LMT.
According to the scheme, any migrant labour or beneficiary under One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC) plan can avail the benefit of free ration from nearly 5 lakh ration shops across the country. So far, over 61 Crore portability transactions have benefitted the beneficiaries away from their homes.
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