How NREGS' very essence has become its biggest challenge

Ground reports from across the country show NREGS is facing a plethora of problems. Primary among these is a sharp cut in central funds to most states.

By TNN | Updated: Apr 03, 2015, 11.42 AM IST

How NREGS' very essence has become its biggest challenge

NEW DELHI: Guarantee' and 'employment' - the very two words that brought sheen to NREGS for many years - have become the biggest challenge to one of the most ambitious pro-poor schemes in the world, making it jaded, unreliable and almost futile in many places.

Even as UPA's pet scheme enters the 10th year, and with finance minister Arun Jaitley making it clear in the Budget that the NDA regime will nurse the scheme, ground reports from across the country show NREGS is facing a plethora of problems. Primary among these is a sharp cut in central funds to most states, which in turn has led to a steep fall in the number of projects, migration of workers due to pending wage bills and families being deprived of the mandatory 100 mandays every year.

The central fund allocation is slashed by up to 45% in some states. Some states are yet to receive the final instalment of this truncated allocation, forcing them to hold back wage bills. West Bengal panchayat minister Subrata Mukherjee said he has been repeatedly urging the Centre to clear Rs 1,000-crore NREGS dues to his state. "This is plaguing the work already undertaken," he said.

Nepal Singha, sabhapati of Salboni panchayat samiti in Bengal's West Midnapore, said that 10 gram panchayats under his samiti owed Rs 2.46 crore to 15,000 workers. "The delay in payment is triggering dissent among workers. They are refusing to take up fresh projects unless their dues are cleared. This has severely affected works like building roads, ponds and dams and making arid land cultivable," he said. Singha is not alone. Hundreds of samitis across the country face the same problem.

Late payments and slashed budget have derailed many projects in Tamil Nadu, which has been rated as the best performing state. "Villagers are not ready to work because of delayed wages. If the delay continues, there will be a problem getting workers under NREGS," said an official, adding there was a shortfall of Rs 1,700 crore in the last quarter of 2014-15.

Sources in the Karnataka government pointed out that the peak working season for NREGS schemes starts from NovemberDecember. "Lack of funds will have a debilitating impact on these schemes as we can't keep up the momentum and meet the needs of the wage seekers," the sources said, adding the Centre was yet to clear Rs 141.5 crore wage bills.

Assam CM Tarun Gogoi also echoed the views that the cut in funds came at a time when NREGS were making substantial progress.

The diminishing central funds have disappointed BJP-ruled states like Maharashtra as well.The state had raised a demand of Rs 1,551 crore for this financial year. "We were expecting Rs 1,100 crore but got Rs 800 crore," said Maharashtra NREGS commissioner Muthukrishnan Sankarnarayan, adding that the state government would raise the remaining Rs 300 crore.

R Ramakumar, an economist with Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, said this was bad news for the "drought-prone state where such employment schemes are paramount for sustaining the livelihoods of rural households".He added that Maharashtra was among the worst states in implementing NREGS. Only 4% of the households in the state have received employment under NREGS, against 25% in India and 62% in Rajasthan, said Ramakumar.

But Rajasthan, a 'poster boy for NREGS', is also slipping. The labour budget in 2014-15 has come down to Rs 2071 crores from Rs 2334 crores in 2013-14. This has reduced the mandays to 1,471 lakhs from 1,878 lakhs in 2013-14.

Till last year, the 100 mandayquota of each family used to be exhausted by February in most parts of the state. In 2014-15, some families did not even log 40 mandays. "I am from a community that used to beg for food, till NREGS changed my life. But there's no work available this time. We can't sit at home. I would be forced to go back to begging if this continues," said Ganga Devi from a village in Ajmer district.

NREGS's past success in states like Rajasthan and TN can be gauged by assets created at the village level.For instance, people of Arjungarh village in Rajasthan's Rajsamand district swear by the check dam built under NREGS in the initial years. "The dam raised the water level of our wells. Earlier, our wells would go dry by now. But despite poor rains in 2014, the wells still have water," says Sevaram.

But politically, the importance of NREGS has come down with a change of governments at both state and central level. A few months ago, CM Vasundhara Raje sug g ested that NREGS be changed from an Act to a scheme, evoking protests. "People have mobilized in large numbers against the CM's suggestion," said Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) leader Nikhil Dey.

Strang ely, in BJP-ruled Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, state officials blamed polls for poor implementation of NREGS projects in last one year.

Chhattisgarh, ironically, had a problem of plenty before the polls.Sources said that as the state headed for the November 2013 polls, its rural development department sanctioned and executed massive NREGS works to benefit the rural masses. Labour and material payments were kept pending, in anticipation that funds would be allocated in the 2014-15 fiscal, and the works were implemented in all the 27 districts without proper monitoring, the sources said. With BJP retaining power, this trend continued till the LS polls.

But with NDA government slashing funds after coming to power at the Centre, NREGS works have almost come to a grinding halt across the state. A top rural development department official admitted that large-scale irregularities were recently unearthed and cases registered against officials.

In many states, the number of works sanctioned under the scheme have gone down, as have the beneficiaries. MP has seen a sharp decline from 4,74,608 works in 2013-14 to 1,76,610 this fiscal. The reach of the scheme has been reduced to 50% in states like Bihar.

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