By HH Mohrmen
One of the most important legislations adopted by the Parliament in 2005, was the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, also known as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. The Act is a rights-based legislation which seeks to empower the poor citizens of the country. The objective of the Act is to encourage the citizens to use their basic rights as enshrined in the Constitution for their own good and for the development of the country.
MGNREG Act mandates that the government is duty bound to provide every citizen his/her work and livelihood as a Matter of right. The MGNREG scheme which is the outcome of the Act is so popular in Meghalaya that people call it by different names. Some call it one hundred days scheme from the main objective of the scheme which is to provide one-hundred-days work in a year to at least one member of every household in the rural areas, while others call it – job card scheme from the fact that every job card holder is entitled to the hundred days work in a year.
Apart from ensuring hundred days work for the bread winner of the family, the other objective of the scheme is also to create the much-needed assets in the rural areas. In fact, MGNREGS has really empowered the rural folks so that in many villages they do not need the support of the MLA or the MDC to construct footpaths, improve the village playground or other activities. Depending on the number of household in the village and how active the respective Village Employment Committee is, some villages were able to get work order worth even one crore in one financial year. This is a monumental achievement for a village and as a matter of fact, the visible development that one sees now in many villages is not because of the development activities initiated by the political leaders but because of the community’s ability to successful implement the MGNREG scheme.
The other unique aspect of this scheme is, all development activities through MGNREGS are implemented using a different approach. It is the community that decides and plans what and how they wish to execute the work in their village. The community makes their demands to the Office of the Block Development Officer for the work they plan to execute in their villages. Of course, more study is needed to know how much community participation is involved in the decision making to select the proposed works, yet it cannot be denied that the scheme has brought the needed development in the village and has to some extent, helped empower the rural folks.
Today the scheme is also used for creation of livelihood opportunities for people in the rural areas. Livestock rearing is one common livelihood activity of the people in the villages, hence many households were able to build pig, chicken and even cow sheds to help them rear domestic animals using the scheme.
When the Coronavirus hit the country and nationwide lockdown was imposed, the whole country came to a standstill. Even MGNREGS works were initially stopped and people were denied access to any kind of livelihood activity. Fortunately, after the first lockdown MGNREGS work resumed and job card holders in the villages started working by following government protocols like maintaining social distancing, wearing masks, etc. When everything was closed due to lockdown, MGREGS work continued to provide jobs to the rural poor and also give them the much-needed income when all other employment avenues were closed. In spite of the lockdown due to COVID-19, MGNREGS works continued but it also depends on the VECs. In villages where the VECs are active, the scheme has been some kind of a support which helped the local people earn some income to support their families.
The hardships that they had endured due to the pandemic had also compelled the central government to come to the rescue of the rural folks. Just after the first lockdown the central government announced immediate relief to help people especially those who have been directly hit by the lockdown. It may be mentioned that after the first lockdown, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced an additional amount of Rs 20 lakh crore package to help revive the country’s economy from the onslaught of the pandemic.
What does this have to do with the MGNREG scheme or how does it relate to this article; one may ask. The fact is of the 20 lakh crores announced, the government has increased the allotment of Rs 40,000 crore to MGNREGS. It may be mentioned that the government has already allotted Rs 61,500 crore to the Scheme in the Union Budges 20-21 which is quite a substantial amount. So, with the additional amount of Rs 40,000 crore, the total sanctioned for MGNREGS during that period comes to a whopping Rs. 1,01,500 crores. The question that needs to be asked is how has the State Government fared with regards to implementing the MGNREG scheme in the state during the last financial year? Has the Government been able to make the best use of the special allocation from the Union Budget towards MGNREG scheme? Has the government been able to use the opportunity to provide employment to people in the rural areas and also help create assets for the development of the villages in the state?
This year’s allocation is huge and it would have been of great help to the rural poor if the state government was able to properly utilise the funds. MGNREGS already has a mechanism in place to help provide employment for the villagers and also to help create assets to develop the villages in the state. The Scheme already has a social audit system which ensures that it is properly implemented and help control the leakage of funds. The question is, how many of the household heads in the state really benefitted from the scheme during the lockdown due the Coronavirus pandemic. How much assets have been created in the different villages of the state during the last two years?
The Government needs to do its own study to see how many rural people in the state were able to get themselves employed and how much income they have earned from the scheme during the lockdown due to the pandemic. The question is how much has the scheme benefitted the rural poor during this extra-ordinary time? The respective Block Development Officers plays a vital role in the implementation of the scheme. In fact it is like a hub where all the important activities take place. Hence it would also be interesting to know which block in the state was able to better support the rural population during their time of trouble using the MGNREG scheme? Perhaps the reason that the rural populace in the state did not complain about the hardship that they had endured during the lockdown as much as the urban poor in the cities and towns is because of the employment provided to them by the Scheme.
In spite of the challenges created by the pandemic, the District Rural Development Agency which is the nodal agency which supervises the implementation of the projects at the district level, the Block Development Officer at the block level and ultimately the Village Employment Committee at the village level were instrumental in the success of the scheme. It is hoped that this central scheme has lived up to its objective and was able to generally provide the hundred days employment to the rural poor every year. Surely the scheme has helped provide employment to people in the villages with active VECs especially during the pandemic when they need employment the most.