View | The importance of MGNREGA

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Despite the criticism the Scheme has received over the years (monument of sixty years of failure, playing with mud, digging holes) it has become a powerful tool for ensuring inclusive growth in rural India. The Act covers the entire country except districts that have a 100 percent urban population.

The Report has more than 30 recommendations.

The more important among them highlights the fact that there has always been a hike in the revised estimate over the budget estimate in the past. However, the BE for 2021-22 has been maintained at Rs 73,000 crore. This when the expenditure in the previous year was in the region of Rs,1,11,000 crore.

If ever an estimate of the impact of the pandemic was needed, these figures bring out starkly the reverse migration from urban to rural areas. MGNREGA was the last resort for all these workers. The Report has emphasized the need for an enhancement in the budget.

The report notes the delay in the release of funds by the Centre to the States. While commenting on the need for closer coordination, the Committee also noted that there are unspent balances with the Department of Rural Development. It has rightly been observed that funds remaining unutilized on one hand along with the existence of pendency in payment of wages reflect poorly.

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The Committee has 'painfully' taken cognizance of the delay in the release of funds. The Act guarantees the release of wages within 15 days from the date of closure of the muster rolls. The pending dues as of 15.11.2021 was Rs 276,378.22 lakh defeating the very purpose of the scheme.

The Committee has also noted the wide disparity in the wage rate between one state to another. From as low as Rs 193 to 198 in Chhattisgarh and MP, Bihar, Jharkhand (the poorer states) to a high of Rs 318 in Sikkim. They have urged the need to ensure the wages are commensurate with inflation and uniform across States.

The Committee has recommended increasing the number of guaranteed working days from 100 to at least 150; this the Committee felt, given the situation in the country, was the ‘need of the hour’. The Committee recommended the need for regularly reviewing the scope and nature of work permitted under the MGNREGA. It emphasised the need to increase the permissible work taking into account the local geographical terrain and local requirements.

The Committee has commented adversely about the delay in giving compensation. The Act provides for payment of compensation for delays beyond 15 days. This is applicable at the rate of 0.05 percent of the unpaid wages per day.

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The Committee has also been ‘dumbfounded ‘to learn about the blatant violation of the provisions of employment allowance. The Act provides that if an applicant for employment under the scheme is not provided employment within 15 days, he/she shall be entitled to a daily unemployment allowance. However, the Committee learnt that zero amount as of 05.11.21 was paid in the name of unemployment allowance.

The Committee noted that despite the MGNREGA stipulating payment of wages to the beneficiaries within 15 days of completion of work, there is inordinate delay. This is mainly due to transfer not taking place due to either a dormant Aadhaar or the bank account not being functional.

The Scheme contemplates the Gram Sabha conducting regular social audits of all projects taken up within the Gram Panchayat. However, this has not been happening- thus in 2020-21, only 29,611 Gram Panchayats were audited at least once.

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The MGRNGA contemplates an Ombudsman to attend to grievances. But as observed by the Committee and more trenchantly by Sanjiv Kumar and S Madheswaran in their working paper 460 of the Institute of Social and Economic Change in the context of Karnataka, the MGNREGA Ombudsman in the absence of any infrastructural support is a ‘forlorn scarecrow’.

The Department of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj would do well to address these deficiencies. MGNREGA is still relevant. As Sudha Narayanan points out the Scheme is a crucial part of ‘comprehensive social protection that serves as a safety net for those who are most vulnerable.

Again, as pointed out, despite the scale of MGNREGA, expenditure has never exceeded an annual 0.4 percent of the GDP since inception. Narayanan states that at no time has MGNREGA accounted for more than 3 percent of total rural employment -belying the belief that the programme was “wrecking the national labour market”. In fact, there is a demand now for expanding the Scheme to the urban poor too.

Surely the time will come when the MGNREGA is no longer required. That would be the day. The pandemic has on the contrary reemphasised the importance of the Scheme as an essential provider of succour.