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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | MGNREGA: Wake-up call -TK Rajalakshmi

MGNREGA: Wake-up call -TK Rajalakshmi

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published Published on Mar 11, 2022   modified Modified on Mar 21, 2022

-Frontline.in

A Parliamentary Standing Committee pulls up the Rural Development Ministry in its report on a “critical evaluation” of the MGNREGA and calls for more investment in the scheme.

A Parliamentary Standing Committee report of the Ministry of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, tabled in February, strongly recommends enhancing the budget for implementation of work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005, higher wage rates, and increasing the number of persondays to 150 from the present 100 days. (The report makes 33 recommendations in all.) It has also pulled up the Rural Development Ministry for its “lackadaisical” approach towards the scheme.

The committee was “bemused” that the Ministry as the nodal agency had highlighted only the “loopholes” of State governments. This was “completely unacceptable” and the blame game was “unpalatable”, it said. The need of the hour in a federal form of government was “not finger-pointing” to the “detriment of a public welfare scheme” but working in “unison” with the “common goal of the upliftment of the lives of the rural masses”. It described as “unfathomable” the notified wage rates of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and West Bengal at Rs.198, Rs.204, Rs.198 and Rs.213 respectively.

Taking a strong view of pending wage liabilities of Rs.2,76,378.22 lakh as of November 2021, the committee stated that it felt “sorry" at the state of affairs. Noting that the beneficiaries of the scheme were people whose hopes for a “decent upliftment of their economic status” hinged upon the “succour” from the scheme, it held that “no reason was good enough” for the “huge pendencies” and asked the Ministry to “pull up its socks”.

It has also expressed surprise at the reduced budget for the scheme in the current fiscal year. The committee, which undertook field visits in some States, observed that the Revised Estimates for the last four to five years had been going up in keeping with the increased demand for work. Therefore, the rationale for keeping the budget estimate for 2021-22 at Rs.73,000 crore was “perplexing”, especially as the expenditure for the previous financial year was Rs.1,11,170.86 crore. The government had itself acknowledged a surge in demand for work in 2020-21 because of reverse migration and the consequent dependence on MGNREGA work as a “last resort of solace”. The Department of Rural Development, it said, should review its budget keeping in mind expenditure of the last few years.

The report is a scathing indictment of the reduced importance given to the MGNREGS, considering the massive scale of rural distress, rural unemployment both in the pre-pandemic and pandemic periods. The MGNREGS as envisaged under the Act is a demand-driven scheme. The Central government under-provided for the scheme in the Budget Estimates of 2021-22, which drew a critical response in the parliamentary committee report. The Budget Estimates for 2022-23 also under-provided for the scheme.

Government spokespersons defend the decision on the grounds that the scheme is demand-driven and is a safety net rather than a solution for unemployment; they say that the Budget for the current fiscal focusses on creating employment and that the dependence on MGNREGA has been consequently reduced. In 2020-21, the allocation for the scheme in the Revised Estimates was much higher than the figure in the Budget Estimates because of the lockdown-induced distress; yet the amount that was released finally fell short of the figure in the Revised Estimates. The Central funds released until September 2021 was less than what was released in 2017-18.

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Frontline.in, 11 March, 2022, https://frontline.thehindu.com/social-issues/general-issues/mgnrega-wake-up-call-parliamentary-report-rural-development-ministry/article38430252.ece?fbclid=IwAR18vEVJU0vsWCcAVfTG1Mzx_MdPr-3jLF_bCeEDlynr1fwd1jFgmwSKQQI


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