nrega and corruption in assam
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NREGA AND CORRUPTION IN ASSAM
The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) has been a subject of lively debate during the
last two years or so. Unfortunately, the factual basis of this debate has been, so far, rather thin. Butnow
beneficiaries under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in Assam will get Rs 100 per
day. The State Government has upgraded the NREGA wage rate from the present Rs 80 to Rs 100 perday. There are around 34 lakh job card holders in Assam. With the increase in daily wage, the spending on
NREGA will be further enhanced by another Rs 136 crore. The state government claimed that NREGA
scheme has been successful in the state during the year 2008-09.
The NREGA evokes extreme reactions from supporters and opponents. When the scheme was launched
in 200 districts in 2005, and later expanded to cover the entire country in 2008, its advocates hailed it as
the beginning of a new era for rural India.
NREGA provides for nine categories of work for integrated rural development including rural infrastructure,
irrigation and water management. But only one type of work rural road-laying was created throughout
Assam. Assam is an agrarian state where water conservation for crop production is critical but
unfortunately Government did not pay any attention to conserve and optimize traditional water bodies inrural areas.
For generating avenues of self employment in rural areas under the chief ministers special employment
program of 2010-11, an amount of Rs 35.50 crore has been allocated to the State Institute of Rural
Development (SITD) to assist around 12000 farmers, women weavers and unemployed youths, as said by
our honorable chief minister Tarun Gogoi.
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But Assam has failed to ensure 100 days of rural employment under National Rural Employment
Guarantee Act (NREGA). Out of 31.85 lakh job card holders in the State, only 28 per cent found jobs in the
2009-10 fiscal that ended in March 31st
. Seventy-eight per cent of those who got jobs could retain theirwork for only 30 days. For some 30 per cent, jobs lasted for 10 days or less. Only 7394 lucky households
across Assams 2221 gaon panchayats got jobs for 100 days.The Act guaranteeing 100 days work should
have provided over 31 crore person-days of work for more than 31 lakh registered households in the State.
But only 4,164,083 person-days employment were created, and women accounted for only 21 per cent of
working days. More surprisingly, only 0.64 per cent of the 31 lakh job card holders belonged to families
living below the poverty line (BPL). If NREGA is meant for the poorest of the poor and only 0.64 per cent
BPL persons got jobs, who are the real beneficiaries?
A systemic corruption and lack of transparency on the part of state Congress government NREGA officials
have made NREGA a major source of corruption in Assam.And it is very interesting thatmany government
employees were illegally provided job cards under the NREGA and this was in gross violation of the
norms.There is no doubt that the NREGA suffers from corruption.
Of course, it is also important to ensure that the reported expenditure levels actually correspond to real
work and wages. Earlier employment programmes have left a long trail of fake muster rolls and embezzled
money. However, there is growing evidence that firm enforcement of NREGAs extensive transparency
safeguards can go a long way in preventing corruption. For instance, a recent verification of muster rolls,
found that 95 per cent of the wages paid according to the muster rolls had actually been received by the
concerned labourers. This is a significant achievement, especially in contrast with the massive levels of
fraud observed.
The systemic corruption cases in places like Karimganj and Barpeta have also showed that how officials
have bypassed the Panchayati Raj institutions which were intended to play an important role in planning
and executing this flagship program to respond to the local needs of the people. Specially, the issue of
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fake job cards, job cards deposited in the custody of implementing officials or political party middlemen,
delayed payment are being used for nefarious purpose of minting money illegally.
Another corruption has highlighted that the official estimates of wages realized by workers are in fact
inflated because the actual wages received by workers were much less than what is shown in the official
documents. Cases of corruption, elusion in muster rolls, discrepancies in work days and payments havebeen reported.It would be inexperienced to think that the long history of fraud in public works programmes
has already come to an end. But recent experience shows that it is possible to remove mass corruption
from NREGA. This calls for strict implementation of the transparency safeguards, as well as firm action
whenever corruption is exposed. In these simple steps lies the future of the Act, and of all those for whom
it is a new ray of hope.