HCL Infosystems has been awarded a contract from the Government of Madhya Pradesh to implement India’s largest food-coupon-based Targeted Public Distribution Systems (TPDS) in the state.

This involves setting up an efficient model for food and civil supplies distribution in the state based on the UIDAI guidelines—for over 10 million expected transactions per month at INR 10.98 (per transaction per family) spread over 78 months. While the Below Poverty Line (BPL) and Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) families (approximately 10 million) would get access to the scheme for free, Above Poverty Line (APL) families (approximately 8 million) will need to pay one-time registration fee of INR 250 only.

The deployment would not only make use of technology to increase efficiency and transparency in the current system with food coupons distributed to the BPL, AAY and APL families but also generate approximately USD 50 million UID numbers after the verification and deduplication process. These food coupons will capture biometric, tax, demographic and personal information details, enabling authorities to ensure proper distribution of food rationing and other benefits.

J V Ramamurthy, President & COO, HCL Infosystems, said, “This project is a step in the right direction to make the PDS more robust and effective, empowering the underprivileged with systems that are truly people-centric.”

The foundation of TPDS has been laid to deal with issues such as bogus/duplicate ration cards, food leakage/manipulation timely informing authorities of any irregularities. HCL says that this food coupon-based system will ensure that consumers can monitor food grains and other supplies rightfully assigned to them.

The project to cover the entire state (50 districts and over 20,000+ Fair Price Shops) will be implemented in four phases over the period of 16 to 18months.