Activists also opposed to use of JCB machines Hundreds of protesting villagers march towards the Chief Minister’s residence The Gehlot government’s honeymoon with activist groups seems to be nearing its end with their growing frustration over the lackadaisical approach of authorities to the transparency clause in the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS). Though among the best in the country in the implementation of the scheme, Rajasthan has seemingly gone back...

The Rajya Sabha on Thursday approved re-naming the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGREGA), but not before the Government was criticised for corruption in the implementation of the scheme launched in 2005. Responding to clarifications, Union Minister for Rural Development C.P. Joshi announced that there would be a “different wage index” under the scheme, one that may not necessarily be...

Breaking decades of silence over unjust social norms, widowed, abandoned and destitute women from different states in India came together at the national capital to launch the National Forum for Single Women's Rights to demand food, healthcare, employment and rights to property. It has been more than eight years since the January 2001 earthquake struck the Indian state of Gujarat, but Hansa Rathore still cannot quite shake off memories of...

The Bhilwara social audit team repeatedly came up against resistance. Yet the coming together of civil society and government in Rajasthan augurs well for the future of NREGA.  For watchers of India’s grassroots democracy, the place to be in recently was Bhilwara in Rajasthan; the town and the countryside were decked out in carnival colours for an audit exercise that saw thousands come together — social rights activists led by...

In one of the biggest mobilisations of its kind in the case of any government programme in the country so far, some 1,700 persons are at present carrying out a unique social audit of the implementation of the UPA Government’s much talked about Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in Bhilwara, the constituency of Union Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Minister C. P. Joshi in Rajasthan. Right to Information activists...