JOKE OF THE DAY! Notice to ‘distributor’ of maggot rice but not to govt supplier

The government has its ways to deal with and get out of any situation. But it finds itself in an increasingly embarrassing saga where it has been caught with its sacks down- as it were- as sacks of maggot-filled rice have been found in multiple fair price shops.

Passing the parcel is the favourite game of the Civil Supplies Department

When we were children, we all played this game called passing the parcel where each child keeps passing a parcel when the music plays and the kid caught with the parcel when the music stopped, would have to step out of the game.

The Civil Supplies Department seems to be playing this game rather well at a very professional level.

After an initial denial as ‘old news’, when O Heraldo reported this, there was clear irrefutable evidence, photos and testimonies of maggot-filled rice in shops. Seeing this, the department has ‘passed the parcel’. It has blamed the fair price shops for ‘distributing’ maggot-filed rice, amusingly ignoring the fact that this unfit for consumption rice was supplied under the government’s care and supervision.  It has now gone a step further and issued a show cause notice to one of the fair price shop owners from Davorlim ‘for taking the public for granted’ by distributing maggot-infested rice.

So, are they getting Aladdin’s lamps?

So will the Honourable Minister give Aladdin’s lamps with the sacks of smelly rice, to convert it into beautiful tasty rice, to avoid the poor fair price shop owner from getting prosecuted?

The presence of maggot-filled rice in so many fair-price shops is not an accident. Money has been made somewhere for so much dangerously flawed smelly maggot-filled rice to show up.  We know now who may have made the money and who is getting prosecuted.

 Shouldn’t giving edible rice to those who need it most be the most civil thing to do for the Civil Supplies Department?

It is truly a joke to issue a show cause notice to a fair price shop, without any inquiry or show cause notice to the source of the maggot-filled rice. And did the fair price shops take the public for granted? They are the ones who have been begging and pleading for the bad rice to be replaced with good rice.

Is the government trying to insinuate that all the rice that reached the shops was in perfect condition and got attacked by maggots in the fair price shops? And what will they do now to see that the poor who depend on ration card-procured rice get edible rice in the first place?  Shouldn’t that be the most civil thing to do for the Civil Supplies Department?

If there is any decency, humanity and civility left, the inquiry promised by the highest office of the land should be thoroughly conducted and those responsible for supplying rice now fed to cats and dogs, be criminally prosecuted and fair price shop owners shouldn’t be unfairly harassed.