Right to Food Bill likely in Parliament's winter session

NEW DELHI: The government will only be able to introduce the Right to Food Bill in the winter session of Parliament. Food minister K V Thomas said this here today, pointing out that the process of consultations on the draft bill approved by the relevant empowered group of ministers (EGoM) was still on with states and would take longer than expected.

The bill is currently being processed in the law ministry. It was earlier expected to be introduced in the monsoon session of Parliament but several rough edges including its cash transfer component and its impact on open market prices are still to be ironed out. In either case, the Food Act would be implemented only from the next fiscal (first reported by ET) since after its introduction in Parliament, the bill would have gone to the Standing Committee of Parliament before being adopted. That process was expected to take not earlier than January 2012.

While the food ministry had proposed a median coverage of 75% of the rural poor under the bill, in an attempt to bridge the recommendations of the NAC and that of the PMEAC, the NAC had suggested coverage of upto 90% of the rural poor.