UPSC Mains 2013 GS Paper 3 Q4: model answer
Food Security Bill is expected to eliminate hunger and malnutrition in India. Critically discuss various apprehensions in its effective implementation along with the concerns it has generated in WTO.
What the question wants
Critically discuss the doubts over effective implementation of the Food Security Bill and the concerns it raised at the WTO.
How to structure it
Promise, apprehensions, WTO.
- What the Bill offered
- Implementation apprehensions
- Concerns at the WTO
- Way forward
How to think it through
The Bill (Act, 2013) promised 5 kg of grain per person at ₹1–3 per kg to two-thirds of the population. Doubts: leaky PDS, wrong targeting, fiscal cost, procurement and storage, cereal focus ignoring nutrition. WTO: procurement at administered prices counts as Amber Box support; developed countries feared India would breach the 10% de minimis. Bali (2013) gave a peace clause.
Model answer
The National Food Security Bill, passed as an Act in September 2013, promised 5 kg of grain a month to each eligible person at ₹3, ₹2 and ₹1 a kg for rice, wheat and coarse grains. Two-thirds of Indians would be covered. The promise was bold; the doubts were real.
Apprehensions in implementation
- Leakages: the Planning Commission's 2005 evaluation had found large leakages in the PDS.
- Targeting errors: identification of beneficiaries without a reliable census.
- Fiscal burden: food subsidy was expected to exceed ₹1.2 lakh crore a year.
- Procurement concentrated in a few states; storage was short and grain rotted.
- Cereal bias: hunger was addressed, but not micronutrient malnutrition.
- Centre–state friction over coverage and costs.
- Cash or kind: debate over whether cash transfers would serve better.
Concerns at the WTO
- Buying grain at administered prices for stocks counts as trade-distorting Amber Box support.
- The de minimis limit is 10% of the value of production, calculated with 1986–88 reference prices, which exaggerates India's support.
- Exporters feared Indian stocks would be dumped on world markets.
- At Bali (December 2013) India secured an interim peace clause, later made open-ended until a permanent solution is found.
Way forward
- End-to-end PDS computerisation, Aadhaar-linked ePoS, nutritional add-ons and a permanent WTO solution.
The Act made food a legal right; the decade since has been about making that right leak-proof and WTO-proof.
Draw: A flow: procurement at MSP → FCI stock → PDS, with a WTO flag at the procurement stage.
Keywords, cases and data to drop in
NFSA 2013, 5 kg per person, AAY 35 kg, PDS leakage, Amber Box, de minimis 10%, 1986–88 external reference price, Bali peace clause, public stockholding.
Where most answers lose marks
- Writing only domestic issues. The WTO concern is half the question.
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Question text as printed in the official UPSC Civil Services (Main) question paper. The model answer is original Battle IAS work; use it to learn structure, not to memorise.
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