Raja Syed Rather
Srinagar, Jul 22 :
The Union Government informed the Lok Sabha that Jammu and Kashmir has 16,57,861 active ration cards as of July 2026, while 3,036 ration cards were deleted in 2025 and 4,767 were deleted in 2024, according to data placed before Parliament.
Replying to an unstarred question in the Lok Sabha, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, as reported by the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), said the country has a total of 20,57,81,055 active ration cards. Jammu and Kashmir accounts for 16.57 lakh of these, while neighbouring Ladakh has 28,105 active ration cards.
The Ministry further stated that 4,767 ration cards were deleted in Jammu and Kashmir during 2024, while the figure declined to 3,036 in 2025. In Ladakh, 615 ration cards were deleted in 2024 and 764 in 2025.
The Centre said that under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), the responsibility for identifying beneficiaries and maintaining beneficiary lists rests with the respective States and Union Territories.
“Ration cards are generally cancelled due to duplicate or ineligible beneficiaries, e-KYC mismatches, deaths and permanent migration of households. However, no ration cards have been reported to have been cancelled solely for failure to complete e-KYC or Aadhaar authentication,” it said.
The government also informed Parliament that no specific reports or complaints of wrongful cancellation of ration cards have been received—(KNO)