Kalimpong and Darjeeling Hills Witness Major Changes as PDS (Ration Card) Beneficiaries Face Sudden Name Deletions, Dealers Seek Answers

Amitava Banerjee, MP, July 20, 2026, Darjeeling: Many people in Kalimpong and Darjeeling Hills found their names struck off the list when they went to collect their monthly rations through the Public Distribution System (PDS) on Sunday.

The PDS dealers could not give specific reasons for the sudden deletion, except the messages sent by the Food Supply Department.

"Overnight, around 2 lakhs cards have been deleted out of the 4 lakh plus cards in the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration area. More than 30 per cent to 40 per cent names that have been deleted come from the economically backward strata and actually need the rations," Manoj Gurung, president, MR Dealers' Association of North Bengal, told Millennium Post.

"As many as 403 families used to collect rations from us under the PDS. Today, the number has come down to 286 families," stated Santosh Gupta of an MR shop in Darjeeling.

When he was trying to use the Electronic Point of Sale (EPOS) machine for the cards that have been ‘deleted’, the machine displayed the message "Card does not have entitlement" message.

Though MR dealers could not state any reasons for this, sources claimed that the names have been axed based on Income Tax data as they apparently have high annual income as per income tax returns filed by them.

"I earn my living by sewing and mending clothes. We had 10 cards in my family. My son runs a small repair shop. He files ITR but is not taxable. All our names have been deleted. We will find ourselves in a very difficult situation with rations being discontinued," stated Nazir Hussain.

Echoing similar sentiments, Navin Subba stated: "I am a retired person. We have 5 members in our family. All our names have been struck off the list. No reasons have been given also. What will we do now? Not only for getting ration, ration cards are important identification documents."

Tara Sundas, CPIM leader, stated: "Darjeeling Hills and Kalimpong had been given a special status owing to difficult terrain, a huge population working in tea gardens, and the area being a non-cereal zone. It comes under Difficult Hill Area Allocation.

Kalimpong district had 2,30,899 beneficiaries. The number has been reduced to 1,82,242 in the last two days of deletion. Similarly, in the Darjeeling district hill region, 15,469 names have been deleted from the 7,30,031 beneficiaries. We will have to protest against this."

In 2016, during the conversion of ration cards in the hills of North Bengal, the state government had introduced a blanket categorisation of all hill residents under the "AAY" (Antyodaya Anna Yojana) category in digital ration cards, a special Central government scheme launched in 2000.

Authorities could not be contacted for comments.

Courtesy & source- Millennium Post