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MAHATMA GANDHI NATIONAL RURAL EMPLOYMENT GUARANTEE ACT: A FLAGSHIP PROGRAMME FOR INCOME, EMPLOYMENT AND EMPOWERMENT VARDHAN M S, Independent Researcher, Ahmadabad Abstract Over the last eight years, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) has been the mainstay for poverty alleviation in our vast rural areas. While standing as a testimony to the Government’s commitment and concern for the cause of the rural poor, it attracted worldwide attention for its novelty and universal coverage. This paper studies performance of MGNREGA in terms of income, employment and the inclusion of vulnerable sections of the society. Key words: MGNREGA, employment, empowerment, inclusion. INTRODUCTION Agricultural wage earners, small and marginal farmers and casual workers engaged in nonagricultural activities, constitute the major chunk of the rural poor. Small land holdings and their low productivity are the cause of poverty among households dependent on land-based activities for their livelihood. Poor educational base and lack of other vocational skills also increase poverty. Due to the poor physical and social capital base, a large proportion of the people are forced to seek employment in vocations with extremely low levels of productivity and wages. The creation of employment opportunities for the unskilled workforce has been a major challenge for development planners and administrators. This paper studies performance of MGNREGA in terms of income, employment and the inclusion of vulnerable sections of the society. OVERVIEW OF RURAL EMPOWERMENT PROGRAMMES Education system in India is not tuned to the changing economic scenario. The large agriculture workforce in rural areas is not sustainable with declining cultivable land and use of modern methods of cultivation. As a result, the rural labour is pushed into cities in search 11
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of work but they do not have adequate employable skills required in the urban formal sector and often end up doing odd jobs in urban areas. Urbanization in this country is mainly due to acute poverty in rural areas rather than due to the economic opportunities in urban areas. The adverse effect of the economic downturn continues to influence the lives of millions of poor and vulnerable globally. The steep increase in the food and energy prices, falling values of national currencies, decline in purchasing power due to shrinking employment opportunities, progressive withdrawal of the national governments in many countries from social sectors due to resource crisis etc. have caused the highlighting of the worsening economic conditions of poor and marginalized communities in general and rural poor in particular in most countries of the world. Notwithstanding this worldwide phenomenon, various countries due to the active and consistent policy decisions are promoting the doctrine of ‘inclusive economic growth’ with unhindered focus on the social sector particularly on rural development, the Indian rural population are not only separated from the effect of global economic downslide. The government has been continuously working towards translating visions into policies and programmes. Based on the experience and performances, initiatives have been taken to undertake course correction implementation process, modify and include new elements in some of the existing schemes and programmes like the MGNREGA, Indira Awaas Yojana (IAY), Integrated Watershed Management Programme (IWMP), and National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP) etc. To make them more effective, blueprints have been drawn up for new schemes like National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) to bring about a paradigm shift in the approach to poverty alleviation and resultant self-reliance in the rural areas. NATIONAL RURAL EMPLOYMENT GUARANTEE SCHEME (NREGS) Government of India introduced the world’s largest poverty alleviation programme in human history in the form of the NREGS. The Government of India enacted this flagship Programme in September 2005. The NREGS came into effect, on a pilot basis, in February 2006 in 200 economically disadvantaged districts of the country. In the second phase of implementation, it was extended to 130 additional districts and the remaining districts were covered in the third phase on April 1, 2008. The programme was dedicated to the Father of the Nation from 2nd October 2010, the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi and since then it is known as MGNREGA (Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India). 12
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The scheme provides a legal guarantee for one hundred days of employment in every financial year to adult members of the rural household willing to do public work related unskilled manual work at the statutory minimum wage. The Act also aims at creating durable assets and strengthening the livelihood resource base of the rural poor. MGNREGA is the largest rights-based employment guarantee programme in the world, reaching over 40 million households across India, with a strong focus on social equity through the participation of the poorest and most excluded in India. Among the key factors driving MGNREGA’s success are high levels of national ownership and commitment to pro-poor policies; a vibrant civil society at national and local level; existing decentralized government system and progress in providing employment for the poor (www.MGNREGA.nic.in). SALIENT FEATURES OF MGNREGA The provisions of MGNREGA are (Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India, 2006): 1. Adult members of a rural household, willing to do unskilled manual work, may apply for registration in writing or orally to the local Gram Panchayath. 2. The Gram Panchayath after due verification will issue a Job Card. The Job Card will bear the photograph of all adult members of the household willing to work under MGNREGA and is free of cost. 3. The Job Card should be issued within 15 days of application. 4. A Job Cardholder may submit a written application for employment to the Gram Panchayath, stating the time and duration for which work is sought. The minimum days of employment have to be at least fourteen. 5. The Gram Panchayath will issue a dated receipt of the written application for employment, against which the guarantee of providing employment within 15 days. 6. Employment will be given within 15 days of application for work, if an applicant did not get work within 15 days then daily unemployment allowance as per the Act, has to be paid liability of payment of unemployment allowance is of the State government. 7. Work should ordinarily be provided within 5 km radius of the village. In case work is provided beyond 5 km, extra wages of 10 per cent are payable to meet additional transportation and living expenses. 8. At least one-third beneficiaries shall be women who have registered and requested work under the scheme. 13
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9. Work site facilities such as crèche, drinking water, shade have to be provided. 10. The shelf of projects for a village will be recommended by the Grama sabha and approved by the Zilla Panchayath. 11. At least 50 per cent of works will be allotted to Grama Panchayath for execution. 12. Permissible works predominantly include water and soil conservation, afforestation and land development works. 13. A 60:40 wage and material ratio has to be maintained. No contractors and machinery is allowed. 14. The Central Government bears the 100 per cent wage cost of unskilled manual labour and 75 per cent of the material cost including the wages of skilled and semi-skilled workers. 15. Social Audit has to be done by the Gram Sabha. 16. Grievance redressal mechanisms have to be put in place for ensuring a responsive implementation process. 17. All accounts and records relating to the Scheme should be available for public scrutiny. PERFORMANCE OF MGNREGA The performance of MGNREGA can be evaluated in terms of income, employment and the inclusion of vulnerable sections of the society. The following section studies these aspects in detail. Table 1 Total expenditure and wages disbursed under MGNREGA Year
Amount spent on wages Total Expenditure (Rs. In (Rs. In crores) crores)
2006-07
5,842.37
8,823.35
2007-08
10,738.47
15.856.89
2008-09
18,165.57
13.4582.29
2009-10 up to Aug. 13, 2009)
6314.86
8561.25
Total
41061.27
167824.18
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Table 2 Social inclusion: Participation of SC/ST and women Year
SC (%)
ST (%)
Women (%)
2006-07
25
36
41
2007-08
27
29
43
2008-09
29.31
25.41
47.88
2009-10 up to Aug. 13, 2009)
28.94
23.99
52.01
Table 3 Women’s participation in MGNREGA (women workers as a percentage of all MGNREGA workers) States
2008-2009 (%)
Tamil Nadu
82.01
Kerala
71.39
Rajasthan
69.00
Andhra Pradesh
57.75
Karnataka
49.77
Gujarat
46.54
Tripura
44.51
Madhya Pradesh
41.67
Maharashtra
39.99
Sikkim
36.73
Orissa
36.39
Haryana
34.44
Assam
30.85
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ECOSENTIMENTS JOURNAL, VOLUME 1, ISSUE 2, 2013 Himachal Pradesh
30.11
Bihar
26.62
West Bengal
16.99
Punjab
16.29
Uttar Pradesh
14.53
Jammu & Kashmir
1.08
All India
49.33 Source: Available at www.MGNREGA.nic.in.
MGNREGA has also initiated the world’s largest financial inclusion measure by providing poor people access to the formal banking system. The impact of this has yet to be assessed by experts in the field of financial management close to 5 crore savings bank accounts have been opened with post offices and banks across the country just for the payment of wages under MGNREGA. States like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Uttaranchal, Kerala, and Himachal Pradesh have opened saving bank accounts for all the MGNREGA workers while others like Orissa, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan have made substantial progress in providing banking services to poor rural folks. CONCLUSION Over the last eight years, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) has been the mainstay for poverty alleviation in our vast rural areas. While standing as a testimony to the Government’s commitment and concern for the cause of the rural poor, it attracted worldwide attention for its novelty and universal coverage. REFERENCES 1. Adhikari, A and Bhatia, K (2010): ‘NREGA Wage Payments: Can we rely on the Banks’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.42, No.1, pp.32-39.
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ECOSENTIMENTS JOURNAL, VOLUME 1, ISSUE 2, 2013 2. Arun, J and Varghese, R (2006): ‘NREGA Implementation-1: Reasonable beginning in Palakkad, Kerala’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.41, No.41, pp.49-54. 3. Bhatia, B and Dreze, J (2006): ‘Employment Guarantee in Jharkhand: Ground Realities’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.41, Issue 29, pp.24-29. 4. Vij, Nidhi (2013): ‘Empowering the marginalized: Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in India’, Human Affairs, Vol.23, pp.91-104.
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