India being a Welfare State, the national objective of growth with social justice and progressive improvements in the living standards of the population, makes it imperative to ensure that quality food grain is made available at reasonable prices. The PDS evolved as a major instrument of the Government’s policy for ensuring availability of food grains to the public at affordable prices as well as for enhancing the food security of the poor. It is an important constituent of the strategy for poverty eradication and is intended to serve as a safety net for the poor and it is a crusade against hunger. It stabilizes the open market price of food grains.

PDS is operated under the joint responsibility of the Central and the State Government. In the State of Assam, the Central Government has taken the responsibility of bulk allocation of food grains. Both the Central and State Government jointly share the responsibility for procurement, storage, transportation and distribution of the commodities to the consumers through PDS network involving Wholesale Consumer Co-Operative Society (WCCS),Gaon Panchayat level Samabai Samity (GPSS),Fair Price Shop (FPS),and Large Scale Multipurpose Co-operative Society (LAMPS). The operational responsibilities including allocation within the state, identification of Below Poverty Line (BPL) families, issue of ration cards, supervision and monitoring the functioning of PDS network rests with the State Government through the district/autonomous district council/sub-divisional authorities.