Under Department of Food & Public Distribution, Government of India this scheme, ONORC, aims to provide an option to all eligible ration card holders/beneficiaries covered under NFSA to access their entitlements from anywhere in the country.

Objective of One Nation One Ration Card:

The main objective of the scheme is to introduce nation-wide portability of ration card holders under National Food Security Act, 2013 (NFSA), to lift their entitlement foodgrains from any FPS in the country without the need to obtain a new ration card, by integrating the existing PDS systems/portals of States/UTs with the Central systems/portals, etc.

The poor migrant workers will be able to buy subsidised rice and wheat from any ration shop in the country but for that their ration cards must be linked to Aadhaar.

12 states were added on 1st January 2020. As of August 2020, 25 states and union territories are integrated into One Nation One Ration Card plan. It will be rolled out in all the Indian states and UTs by March 2021

The characteristics of the ONORC are:

1. Existing ration cards will be turned as one nation one ration card.
2. Standard format of ‘one nation, one ration card’:

   A standard format for ration card has been prepared after taking into account the format used by different states.

   • For national portability, the state governments have been asked to issue the ration card in bi-lingual format, wherein besides the local langauge, the other language could be Hindi or English.
   • The states have also been told to have a 10-digit standard ration card number, wherein first two digits will be state code and the next two digits will be running ration card numbers.
   • Besides this, a set of another two digits will be appended with ration card number to create unique member IDs for each member of the household in a ration card.
3. It will be a universal ration card allotted to each beneficiary registered under NFSA.
4. Using the ONORC, a beneficiary who migrates from one place to another can buy subsidized food grains from the fair price shop located in the destination city regardless of the origin of the beneficiaries.
5. The beneficiaries will be identified through biometric authentication on electronic Point of Sale (ePoS) devices. These devices will be installed at each fair price shop.
6. The national portability will work using the:
   • Integrated Management of Public Distribution System (IM-PDS) portal – It will provide the technological platform for the ration cards portability.
   • Annavitran portal – It will host the data of the food grains distribution through ePoS devices within a state. This will help a beneficiary to access subsidized food grains within a state (inter-district.)
7. Aadhar Cards will be seeded with ration cards which will help beneficiaries get the ration using the same ration card.

Who is eligible for One Nation One Ration Card

Any citizen, who is declared under Below Poverty Line (BPL) category will be eligible to get the benefit of this scheme across the country. Seventeen states have operationalised ‘one nation-one ration as of now with Utarakhand being the latest state to come on board.States implementing ONORC are eligible for additional borrowing of 0.25% of gross   state domestic product.

The beneficiaries will be identified on the basis of their Aadhar based identification through the electronic point of sale (PoS) device. All the PDS shops will have the facility of electronic PoS devices.

One Nation One Ration Card’ scheme is also aimed at reducing the incidents of hunger deaths in the country, to further improve rankings in the Global Hunger Index.

‘Mera Ration’ App: