Times of
India: Patiala: Thursday, September 13, 2018.
For
a social security measure that aims to guarantee the ‘right to work’ by
providing at least 100 days of wage employment every fiscal to each household,
the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) seems to
have done poor little for many in the last financial year. Information procured
under the Right to Information (RTI) Act has revealed that only 217 persons in the
country got the unemployment allowance under MGNREGA in 2017-18, with no
beneficiary from Punjab.
Under
the Act, labourers who seek work but can’t get it within 15 days, are eligible
for unemployment allowance. However, Ropar-based activist and lawyer Dinesh
Chadha, who filed RTI application to the Union ministry of rural development,
found that it was not so.
“The
state government is bound to provide work to the labourers within 15 days as
per the Act. If the government fails to provide 100 days of work to the
labourers, it has to pay (them) unemployment allowance. A total of 25% of wages
under the Act will be given for first 30 days, while for the remaining 70 days
the state government is supposed to provide 50% of the wages to the workers,”
he said. Chadha had received the reply from the Union ministry on August 25.
According
to the ministry’s reply, about 13.17 crore people were registered under the
MGNREGA Act in 2017-18 and out of these, 5.73 crore had sought work. It also
revealed that about 5.11 crore people were given work under the Act and only
about 29.60 lakh could get employment for 100 days during the year. The reply
also revealed that states across India gave unemployment allowance to 217
workers only during the year.
During
this period in Punjab, about 15.27 lakh people were registered under the act
out of which about 7.66 lakh sought work. The ministry revealed that about 6.63
lakh labourers were given work out of which 9,517 were employed for 100 days in
2017-18. The ministry also stated that the since last five years, not a single
person was given unemployment allowance in Punjab under MGNREGA.
“The
authorities do not register the workers’ demand so as not to give them
unemployment allowance. The government is bound to provide the MGNREGA
labourers 100 days of work but the poor labourers are not given unemployment
allowance. The government is supposed to hold awareness camps for MGNREGA
workers, but these are not conducted in the villages,” said Chadha.