The central government is continuously shortening the lifeline of the laborers MNREGA

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is the only scheme in the country to provide employment to workers in the unorganized sector, which proved to be a lifeline for people during the global economic tsunami of 2008 and the worldwide corona crisis in 2020. Statistics show that in the financial year 2020-21, the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India provided employment to 11 crore workers of 7.5 crore families by spending Rs 1.11 lakh crore. This was the highest budgetary allocation in the 16-year history of MGNREGA. One of the main reasons for this was to provide employment to the laborers on a large scale during the transition period like Kovid, when economic activities were closed not only in the country but all over the world.

Despite this, the negative mentality of the central government towards MGNREGA, a scheme to strengthen the economy of rural India, is reflected by the fact that when the Finance Minister presented the budget for 2021-22 in the Lok Sabha, it was included in the budget of the last financial year. In comparison, only Rs 73,000 crore was allocated, cutting MNREGA by 25.51 percent. It was later increased to Rs.98,000 crore by including an amount of Rs.25,000 crore in the revised budget provision. But despite budget cuts, this year 9.75 crore laborers from 6.74 crore families worked in MNREGA schemes.

In the budget allocation for the current financial year 2022-23, the government has crossed the limit. Against the total budget allocation of Rs 98,000 crore last year, it has again allocated only 73,000 crore budget, making a reduction of 12 percent. If we go deep into this budget allocation, we find that out of this 73,000 crores, 18,350 crores will be spent in the financial year 2021-22 only for the arrears payments. This means that the actual budget allocation amount for the year 2022-23 is only 54,650 crores. When the MNREGA Act was brought by the UPA-I government in 2005, 4 per cent of the GDP was allocated for MGNREGA. Which was reduced to 2 percent under BJP rule. At present it has come down even further to 1.7 percent.

The direct impact of this budget cut is on the farm laborers of rural India. The wages of MGNREGA workers of the country are less than the minimum agricultural wages of the states. They are not even guaranteed any kind of social security. The prices of everyday food items are skyrocketing. Things like education, health are getting more expensive, the situation is getting worse. The state governments are directly refusing to give work to the laborers due to lack of funds. The schemes started in the villages have been eclipsed. There is a rapid migration of rural labor families to cities and metros.

On the one hand, the government is continuously reducing the budget allocation, while the government is doing something so that people themselves shy away from working in MNREGA, creating various technical obstacles for this. Earlier the government started creating caste wise FTO impractical. Recently, from the month of May, orders have been issued that attendance is to be made only through smart phones within a limited time period. Along with this, it is mandatory for the laborers to upload photos with the workplace twice in the morning and evening. From August 1, there is a new order that no more than 20 schemes will be run in any gram panchayat. Whereas due to weak monsoon, there are dry conditions in many parts of the country. In such a situation, do or die situation has come before the rural families.

It will be necessary to tell that in many states of the country, MGNREGA workers have outstanding dues of Rs 3989.58 crore for the last 6 months. which can be seen in the chart.

People of more than 2 dozen organizations from Jharkhand have left for Delhi to gherao the Parliament building. In which mainly NREGA Sangharsh Morcha, Center of Indian Trade Union (CITU), farmers organization All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) and Khet Mazdoor Organization All India Khet Mazdoor Union (AIAWU) and under the aegis of “Jharkhand NREGA Watch” from Jharkhand. The ‘Joint Countrywide Campaign’ will continue till August 15. According to trade unions, this campaign is inspired by the Central Government’s Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav, in which the ‘anti-people’ policies of the central government will be exposed.