Cabinet set to clear Food Security ordinance today

New Delhi: After suggesting that it would try to win political consensus on its proposal to give subsidised food to nearly 70 per cent of the country, the government appears to have decided otherwise. Sources say today, the Cabinet will discuss and clear an ordinance that makes the Food Security Bill a law.

The populist and expensive welfare scheme has been championed by Congress president Sonia Gandhi. Her party hopes it will serve as a major vote-getter in important elections coming up soon in Delhi and states like Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The national election is due by May. The Food Security Bill promises wheat at Rs 2 per kilo and rice at Rs 3 to India's poorest. (Read: Why the Food Security Bill is good politics, bad economics)

Last month, the Prime Minister had asked his senior ministers to make one last effort to win over the Opposition, which has said it wants a debate in Parliament on the proposal.

More than the Opposition, the Samajwadi Party (SP), whose support is crucial to the stability of UPA, is strongly opposed to the bill. SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav has openly opposed the bill as "anti-farmer". The Left too had attacked the government for trying to force the scheme without an adequate discussion in Parliament about logistics or its impact on farmers.

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The government's abandonment of that plan is based largely, sources say, on suggestions from the Election Commission that state elections will be announced by September 22. That gives the ruling coalition a narrow window to push through the bill using its special constitutional powers.

The ordinance must be cleared by Parliament within six weeks of its next seating; sources say this may provoke the government to delay the Monsoon Session.

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The government has in the past expressed its concern over the main Opposition party, the BJP, causing a paralysis of the next Parliament session, as it did during the last, demanding the resignation of the Prime Minister over alleged malpractices by his government in how valuable coal fields were assigned at under-valued prices to private firms.