14 August :Implemented by the Ministry of Rural Development, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) 2005 is the flagship programme of the Government that directly touches lives of the poor and promotes inclusive growth.
The Act is the first ever law internationally that guarantees wage employment at an unprecedented scale. It aims at enhancing livelihood security of households in rural areas of the country by providing at least one hundred days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. The auxiliary objective of the Act is to create durable assets and strengthen the livelihood resource base of the rural poor. The choice of works suggested address causes of chronic poverty like drought, deforestation, soil erosion, so that the process of employment generation is on a sustainable basis.
The formulation and implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act(NREGA) was seen as a significant step. With its rights-based framework and demand driven approach, NREGA marks a paradigm shift from the previous wage programmes. Unique features of the Act include, time bound employment guarantee and wage payment within 15 days, incentive-disincentive structure to the State Governments for providing employment as 90 per cent of the cost for employment provided is borne by the Centre or payment of unemployment allowance at their own cost and emphasis on labour intensive works prohibiting the use of contractors and machinery. The Act also mandates 33 percent participation for women.
NREGA came into force on February 2, 2006. In Phase one it was introduced in 200 of the most backward districts of the country, an additional 130 districts were included in Phase two 2007-2008. As per the initial target, NREGA was to be expanded countrywide in five years. However, in order to bring the whole nation under its coverage and keeping in view the demand, the Scheme was extended to all the remaining rural districts of India from April 1,2008.
Over the last two years, implementation trends vindicate the basic objective of the Act. In 2007-08, 3.39 crore households were provided employment and 143.5 crore persondays were generated in 330 districts. This is a 60 crore increase over SGRY (586 districts in 2005-06). Self targeting in nature, the Programme has ensured a high work participation of marginalized groups like SC/ST (57%), women (43%) and BPL(129%). The enhanced wage earnings have lead to a strengthening of the livelihood resource base of the rural poor in India, more than 68% of funds utilised have been in the form of wages paid to the labourers. Nascent evidence through independent studies indicates positive impact of the programme on stemming distress migration, supplementing household incomes, and the regeneration of natural resources.
Enhanced Wage Earning and Increase in Minimum Wages
During the year 2007-08 Rs 10,738.47 crore was paid as wages under NREGA to more than 3.3 crore households out of a total expenditure of Rs 15,856.89 crore.
Since the inception of NREGA state minimum wages for agricultural labourers have increased. In Maharashtra the minimum wage went up from Rs. 47 to Rs. 72 and in Uttar Pradesh it has increased from Rs. 58 to Rs. 100. Similarly wage rates were revised in Bihar from Rs 68 to Rs. 81, in Karnataka from Rs. 62 to Rs. 74, West Bengal from Rs. 64 to Rs. 70, in Madhya Pradesh from Rs 58 to Rs. 85, in Himachal Pradesh from Rs 65 to Rs. 75, in Nagaland, from Rs 66 to Rs 100, in J & K from Rs 45 to Rs. 70, in Chattisgarh from Rs 58 to Rs 72.23.
Impact on Rural Infrastructure and Regeneration of Natural Resource Base
In 2006-2007 about 8 lakh works were taken up of which 5.3 lakh were water conservation, harvesting, irrigation, drought proofing and flood control works. In 2007-2008 17.8 lakh works were undertaken, of which 49% were water conservation works leading to regeneration of natural and livelihood resource base in rural areas. In 2008-2009, upto July, 14.5 lakh works have been taken up.
Through NREGA, Villupuram district in Tamil Nadu has noted an increase in water storage (upto 6 months), significant rise in water level and agricultural productivity (from mono crop to dual crop).
Strengthening Delivery Systems
Transparency and public accountability: Social Audit is an important feature of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. In the context of NREGA the process of Social Audit includes continuous public vigilance and verification of registration of families, distribution of job cards, receipt of work applications and issue of dated receipts, preparation of shelf of projects and selection of sites, allotment of work to applicants, payment of wages, evaluation of work, payment of unemployment allowance, execution of work and maintenance of muster rolls.
Financial Inclusion: The large flow of funds from Government treasury to poor rural households has given the Ministry an opportunity to bring the beneficiaries into the organized banking system. A massive campaign for opening of saving accounts of the NREGA workers in banks and post offices has been launched; 2.28 crore Bank and Post Office accounts under NREGA have been opened.
Use of IT: To further check irregularities in the payment of wages and to safeguard rights of workers, the Ministry of Rural Development decided upon using telephone based banking services which would be easily accessible to the workers even in the remote areas of the country. Banks have also been asked to support initiatives like Smart Cards and other technological interventions for facilitating easy and effective disbursement of wages.
Web enabled Management Information System (MIS)(www.nrega.nic.in), one of the largest data base of rural households, makes transparency intrinsic to NREGA by placing all critical parameters such as wage payments, number of days of employment provided and works under execution, online for easy public access. The system has been designed for alerts to support proactive response by management. 44 lakh Muster Rolls and 3 crore Job Cards have been uploaded so far.
The Ministry’s Knowledge Network encourages online transfer of local solutions and best practices. Currently 400 District Programme Coordinators are members of this network. The network also links up with Civil Society Organizations.
Developing Capacity for delivering a Demand based Programme
NREGA is a significant vehicle for strengthening decentralization and deepening processes of democracy by giving a pivotal role to Gram Sabhas and Panchayati Raj Institutions in planning and implementation of works. The most critical issue is building capacity of these agencies to implement the programme with rigour.
Dedicated administrative and technical personnel at Central cost have been deployed specially at the Block and sub-Block levels to augment human resource capacity.
Training of NREGA functionaries along with monitoring state action has been undertaken. Thus far, 9,27,766 PRI functionaries and 247173 Vigilance and Monitoring Committee members have been trained.
The Ministry has organized Peer Learning Workshops for District Programme Coordinators enlisting active collaborations with civil society organizations, academic institutions to build formal and informal institutional systems and networks. These linkages have also been for resource support such as, research studies, documentation, material development.
Technical support in key areas of communication, training, work planning, IT, social audits and fund management at all levels of implementation is also being provided.
Stemming Distress Migration
As per reports, Bihar and other Indian states, have been witnessing a reverse migration of their work force. Previously the workers had to migrate from Bihar to Punjab, Maharashtra and Gujarat which has gradually declined because of the availability of employment and better wages in their village which discourages migration into cities in search for work. The wage rate, under NREGA in Bihar is Rs. 81 per day. The stemming of migration has also helped the workers children to attend school regularly.
In order to optimize the multiplier effects of NREGA the Ministry of Rural Development is making an effort to bring about greater convergence of programmes like National Horticulture Mission, Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana, Bharat Nirman, Watershed Development, productivity enhancement etc., with NREGA. This will also enable planned and coordinated public investments in rural areas. This will result in creation of greater sustainable livelihoods in the rural areas.
*Inputs from the Ministry of Rural Development