Poor MGNREGA Implementation

The implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Generation Act – MGNREGA in short – has not been very satisfactory in Assam. As a front page news item in this newspaper on Thursday has pointed out, with only about five months left for the year to come to an end, the coverage or performance has been much behind the expected level. It is very disheartening to note that only 2,850 households across Assam have got full 100 days guaranteed employment in the rural areas of the state so far in the current year. There has also been a huge inter-district disparity, with the news item quoting official statistics saying Lakhimpur district alone has accounted for 1,004 households getting full 100 days guaranteed employment so far, with Nalbari coming a poor second with 654. Only four more districts – Jorhat, Charaideo, Sivasagar and Nagaon – have shared the remainder number of households which have got one hundred days employment so far.

This also speaks about the efficiency of the officers concerned of the different districts, as also their bosses sitting in Dispur, while the legislators of the various constituencies too must share the responsibility of the failure that is slowly taking the shape of a collective nature. One example of overall person-days generated in Assam reveals more details about the unsatisfactory performance. Though always believed to be an outcome of manipulated statistics, Assam was able to create only about 330 lakh person-days under MGNREGA during the last financial year. What is interesting to note is that Assam had generated 533.7 lakh person-days during 2018-19, a little over 480.86 lakh person-days during 2017-18, over 466 lakh person-days during 2016-17, and over 6 lakh person-days during 2015-16. Given this scenario, it definitely calls for a detailed enquiry as to why this sudden drop or lagging behind. In comparison, a state like Chhattisgarh could generate more than 672 lakh person-days during the same period, Andhra Pradesh 1,492 lakh, Jharkhand 385 lakh, Odisha 407 lakh, to mention a few. Even a small state like Tripura was able to make a remarkable performance with 209 lakh person-days generated during the same period.

This does not reflect well on the overall performance of the BJP-led government of Sarbananda Sonowal, which has been claiming a lot of success on the development front in the past three years or more. Leaders of the other two partners of theBJP-led government – the Asom Gana Parishad and the BPF – must also share the blame of poor performance, because these two regional parties together also have control and inuence over a sizeable number of constituencies and development blocks of the state. A look at the Government of India website on MGNREGA will reveal the overall status of poor performance of Assam in this very important sector that affects the vast majority of rural people. According to the website, while there are 50.69 lakh jobcards issued in Assam, only 28.99 lakh jobcards are said to be of the ‘active’ category. Similarly, of the total number of 86.04 lakh jobcard holder workers in Assam, only 44.18 lakh are ‘active’. The total number of completed works in the current financial year is also lagging much behind. While 1,41,713 works were completed under MGNREGA in Assm during 2018-19, this year only 37,585 works have been completed in the first seven months; and even if this trend continues, there is little possibility of reaching even the halfway mark of the previous year’s performance. Chief Minister Sonowal should take a close look and call for a detailed analysis for this poor performance. After all, it is the rural people who are suffering.