Prime Minister Narendra Modi keeps issuing statements that the number of poor has decreased under his rule. He seems to think that it is easy to reduce poverty by changing the parameters of identifying the poor.

Simply by applying a different set of indicators, crores  of people have been kept out of the reach of BPL cards. Many have lost their BPL cards for owning a small TV. They may not be eligible for BPL cards any longer but they continue to feel hungry. There have been reports that many have died as they have been denied ration for not possessing Aadhaar cards. Supply of ration through BPL cards was stopped to people in several parts of the country including Karnataka for not possessing Aadhaar cards.It is estimated that about three crore ration cards have been suspended.

Jharkhand’s Koili Devi, a victim of this mess, knocked on the doors of the Supreme Court. Devi’s ration card was cancelled in March 2017 as she did not have Aadhaar card. The family had to live in hunger. In September 2018, her daughter died of hunger. The family did not have anything other than salt and tea powder. Even on the day the daughter died, the family could consume only salt and tea. Devi is now fighting a battle holding the government responsible for her daughter’s death.

Demonetization in 2016 significantly increased the poverty in the country. Hundreds of laborers lost their jobs and malnutrition increased. The cancellation of ration cards added to the woes of those who were already hit hard because of demonetization. The government snatched not only jobs but also ration supplies. We need to bear in mind that those who are not able to procure Aadhaar cards belong to very poor sections of the society.

The middle class struggled and managed to obtain Aadhaar cards by standing in queues and roaming different offices. But it was impossible for families that were already in the grip of hunger to go after Aadhaar cards. Similarly, adivasis and tribal people found it difficult to even submit documents to obtain Aadhar cards. The families that were not able to obtain Aadhaar cards were those who depended on ration cards. Unfortunately, the specter of Aadhaar cards snatched their rights to live.

After the lockdown, the state of the poor in the country has become more pathetic. In the three months of the period of lockdown, the media published numbers about people who died due to the Coronavirus. However, the number of people who died due to hunger never came to light because hunger does not figure in any list of diseases. But hunger is the mother of all diseases as it slowly and steadily takes away the lives of people. Hospitals do not have machines to identify hunger. No hospital writes a report that a death has occurred because of hunger. It seems that doctors have decided that hunger does not fall under their purview. If hunger were to be included in the list of diseases, the numbers would show that more people died because of hunger than those dying due to the Coronavirus. The three crore ration cards that were snatched away have also contributed to these deaths.

We should immediately stop bhajans around the Coronavirus and pay attention to the living condition of migrant laborers in both rural and urban areas. Similar to the gathering of data about the number of people infected with the Coronavirus, the government should obtain a report about the living condition of these laborers. Investigations should be conducted about the number of people who have died due to hunger. Details should be obtained about the number of laborers who are availing the facilities of the public distribution system. If it is found that these laborers do not have ration cards, efforts should be made to find out the reasons for this. India which was called a developing country is now in the list of poor countries after demonetization. The United Nations has warned that poverty will increase in the coming days. In this context, it is the government’s duty to increase the availability of food grains to the poor. If three crore ration cards are cancelled at this juncture, we perhaps have to assume that the government has designed a major programme to annihilate the poor through hunger.

Taking cognizance of this, the Supreme Court has issued notice to the Centre and the state governments. But we cannot assume that the governments would take the notices seriously. The government that has already snatched away the cylinder subsidies seems to be considering cancelling the ration cards too. When the entire country is in the grip of hunger, industrialists like Adani and Ambani are prospering and have not been impacted by either demonetization, Coronavirus, or lockdown.

This is because the government has assumed that the country’s progress and development means the growth and development of Adani and Ambani. For the growth of these two industrialists, the government has thrown crores of people to the jaws of death. If the government’s agricultural policy is implemented, the public distribution system will slowly disappear. How can we then expect that the government will provide justice to the three-crore people whose ration cards have been cancelled.

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London, Aug 5 (PTI): An Indian-origin taxi driver based in Ireland for over 23 years has become the latest to be targeted in an unprovoked attack in the capital Dublin, with local police (Gardai) launching an investigation into the violent assault.

Lakhvir Singh, in his 40s, told local media that he picked up two young men in their 20s on Friday night and dropped them at Poppintree, in the Ballymun suburb of Dublin.

Upon arriving at the destination, the men are said to have opened the vehicle door and struck him twice on the head with a bottle. As the suspects fled, they reportedly shouted: "Go back to your own country".

"In 10 years I've never seen anything like this happen," Singh told ‘Dublin Live’.

"I'm really scared now and I'm off the road at the moment. It will be very hard to go back. My children are really scared," he said.

A Dublin police spokesperson said Singh was taken to the city's Beaumont Hospital with injuries determined as not life-threatening.

"Gardaí are investigating an assault reported to have occurred in Poppintree, Ballymun, Dublin 11 at approximately 11:45 pm on Friday, 1st August 2025. A man, aged in his 40s, was brought to Beaumont Hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injury. Investigations are ongoing," the spokesperson said.

The incident followed an Indian Embassy advisory, also issued on Friday, expressing safety concerns following recent attacks in and around the capital Dublin and urging Indian citizens to take safety precautions.

"There has been an increase in the instances of physical attacks reported against Indian citizens in Ireland recently,” states the advisory.

“The embassy is in touch with the authorities concerned in Ireland in this regard. At the same time, all Indian citizens in Ireland are advised to take reasonable precautions for their personal security and avoid deserted areas, especially at odd hours," the statement reads, adding emergency embassy contact details as 0899423734 and cons.dublin@mea.gov.in.

It came in the wake of a brutal attack on a 40-year-old Indian man at Parkhill Road in the Tallaght suburb of Dublin on July 19, described as “mindless, racist violence” by locals.

The Gardai had opened an investigation into the case and Indian Ambassador to Ireland Akhilesh Mishra was among those who took to social media to express shock over the attack.

“Regarding the recent incident of physical attack on an Indian national that happened in Tallaght, Dublin, the embassy is in touch with the victim and his family. All the requisite assistance is being offered. The embassy is also in touch with the relevant Irish authorities in this regard,” the embassy said in a social media post days after the incident.

A Stand Against Racism protest was also held by the local community in condemnation of what was described as a "vicious racist attack" and to express solidarity with migrants.

Last week, Dr Santosh Yadav took to LinkedIn to post details of a “brutal, unprovoked racist attack”.

The entrepreneur and AI expert stressed that it was not an isolated incident and called for “concrete measures” from the governments of Ireland and India to ensure Indians feel safe to walk the streets of Dublin.

His post revealed that a group of six teenagers attacked him from behind as he walked to his apartment in Dublin.

“This is not an isolated incident. Racist attacks on Indian men and other minorities are surging across Dublin — on buses, in housing estates, and on public streets. Yet, the government is silent. There is no action being taken against these perpetrators. They run free and are emboldened to attack again,” reads Yadav's post.

Fine Gael party Councillor for Tallaght South, Baby Pereppadan, was among those who expressed concern following last month’s attack.

“People need to understand that many Indian people moving to Ireland are here on work permits, to study and work in the healthcare sector or in IT and so on, providing critical skills,” he said.