Hyderabad: Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Saturday asked officials of the civil supplies department to regulate the prices of essential commodities, that have been skyrocketing of late and putting enormous burden on the common man.
The Chief Minister held a review meeting with the officials at the Secretariat to take stock of rising prices.
He directed the officials to initiate stringent measures against traders if they resort to hoarding of stocks and black marketing to hike prices artificially.
Expressing shock over ration cards surpassing households in the state, the Chief Minister said his government will issue new ration cards after weeding out bogus ones from the new state.
“While there are 83.59 lakh households in the state who are eligible for white ration cards, 91 lakh cards have been issued so far, which account of an excess of 7 lakh cards. Besides, there are 15 lakh pink ration cards in excess. These figures show that there are 22 lakh cards in excess in the state, which need to be weeded out to ensure that the subsidy benefits reach the genuine and needy,” Mr Rao said.
He asked the officials to find out whether the excess cards were with the ration shop dealers and if so, a warning to be issued to them to surrender them immediately, failing which severe action to be initiated against them.
The Chief Minister also asked the officials to step up measures to overcome the shortage of fuel in northern Telangana districts.
