NEW DELHI: An outdated system of centrally procuring, transporting and supplying food items like rice, wheat, pulses etc to the 13-lakh-strong Indian Army in locations including 62 cantonments and many non-cantonment military units across the length and breadth of the country is costing much more than the cost of the food items.
In 2010-11, while the Army Service Corps (ASC) spent Rs 2,100 crore in the acquisition of food items, it expended about Rs 1,500 crore on an exclusive distribution system by way of expenditure on manpower, land, buildings, packaging, handling and transportation — more than 71% of the cost of acquisition of food items, says an internal audit report of the defence ministry. “As such distribution through ASC has largely become operationally and economically dysfunctional,” says the report.
ASC, which caters to Indian Army’s ration requirements, is the centralised inter-service agency headed by a director general of supplies and transport (DGST) functioning under quartermaster general (QMG) at the army headquarters.
A main reason why this is so is because the government still follows a 74-year-old British system of centrally procuring food items and distributing it to its soldiers across the length and breadth of the country, leading to a wasteful situation that doesn’t make economic sense.
“In the past there were many issues including non-availability of food items, poor transportation systems across difficult terrains etc. things have changed drastically now,” a government source familiar with the procurement and distribution system told this newspaper. Procuring rations locally is allowed only if the items are not forthcoming through central sources and for which special procedures are prescribed.
