Professional Documents
Culture Documents
) degree in
Agricultural Economics in the Department of Agricultural Economics of
Uttar Banga Krishi Viswavidyalaya
TITLE
BY
B. SWAMINATHAN
B.Sc. (Agri.)
2010
i
for pri
My-Word
ii
My sincerest and most gay some thanks are for my guide and my dear chairman Dr. Tuhin
Narayan Roy sir for his immense help, calculated expertise, targeted approach, result oriented
methodology, ceteris paribus’ guidance, strict perusal, deft handling, and committed efforts at
every level of my dissertation. It is also a wholesome lot of pleasure in thanking my dear head sir,
Dr. Ashutosh Sarkar sir for his ablest mentorship, sure- footed methods, immediate thoughts, strict
atmosphere, dedicated support, committed efforts, germane touch, guaranteed approach and
careful patience at every time and every rhyme of my academic work. Enough thanks cannot be
dedicated, however level best I try for my course teacher Dr. Satyan sarkar sir for his thoughts and
perceptions and profundity, of how to approach a particular topic and how best to bring out the
best from it, in the best way that should be possible. My better than the best of all thanks and
gratitude that could be possible from my level best, could only be to my course teacher Dr. Kalyan
Kranti Das sir, who as a leader of efforts, ladder of support and harbinger of rapport goaded me to
complete every academic activity on time giving final touches in his intimate style, every time
himself running the extra mile. I also hijack this opportunity to pay my humble thanks to Dr.
Arunava Ghosh sir, the member of my Advisory Committee, of the Department of Agricultural
Statistics.
I also feel happy in thanking the entire family of my Agricultural Economics department.
Thanking all the staff, all my seniors and juniors is a memory to cherish and perish with.
In also especially mentioning the names of my seniors Ms. Banani Das and Mr. Dheeraj Rai, I like
to show them that it is easy to include their names in my thesis report but don’t know how to have
their love and labour that they bestowed upon me.
My most honest thanks are to the university itself, for it gave me some of the best people, some of
the best books, some of the best friends, some of the best moments and some of the best memories
that I could never have, even if I take all the seven reincarnations.
I feel pleased within, in thanking the MNREGA officials or those officials additionally holding
responsibility to implement this mega scheme, of every PRIs or LPs that I have had covered.
Especially, I thank Sri Krishna, Village Level Worker ( VLW ) of the Pundibari LP who single-
handedly- often using his own funds- made me to contact other LP officials, that too those LP
officials who can converse in Hindi, my medium. The MNREGA Cell of Cooch Behar needs to be
specially mentioned with gratitude for providing all data of PRIs that are not available on the
Public Domain then, and for patiently answering my queries about the scheme’s progress in every
Local Panchayats (LPs).
Many, many happy thanks to all the beneficiaries of the scheme, all the migrants – of some who
even spoke Tamil – and the rural households that I contacted for this study. More special thanks
to Mr. and Mrs. Biplap Dutta, in whose house I’m a tenant for now.
Ultimately, I thank my krsna, the lovely god and loveable friend, for loving me so much and
giving me lovely parents and lovely pri and a lovely life with lovely gifts plus lovely chances with
all lovely puns and dances, and this lovely dissertation of 1,62,087 characters.
iii
“For even a single person should starve
without food,
Let this whole world get destroyed.”
- Subramaniya Bharati
iv
MNREGA JUSTIFIED!
When Nobel Laureate Prof. Arthur Lewis had written in 1954 a masterpiece article entitled
‘Economic Development with Unlimited Supplies of Labor’, hardly could he have imagined that
nearly 50 years down the line the most populous democracy of the world will launch a scheme
called MNREGA to prove, disprove or improve upon the following ideas manifested in his article:
“…In the neo-classical model capital can be created only by withdrawing resources from
producing consumer goods. In our model, however, there is surplus labor, and if (as we shall
assume) its marginal productivity is zero, and if, also, capital can be created by labor without
withdrawing scarce land and capital from other uses, then capital can be created without reducing
the output of consumer goods. This second proviso is important, since if we need capital or land to
make capital the results in our model are the same as the results in the neo-classical model,
despite the fact that there is surplus labor. However, in practice the proviso is often fulfilled. Food
cannot be grown without land, but roads, viaducts, irrigation channels and buildings can be
created by human labor with hardly any capital to speak of -- witness the Pyramids, or the
marvelous railway tunnels built in the mid-nineteenth century almost with bare hands. Even in
modern industrial countries constructional activity, which lends itself to hand labor, is as much as
50 or 60 per cent. Of gross fixed investment, so it is not difficult to think of labor creating capital
without using any but the simplest tools. The classical economists were not wrong in thinking of
lack of circulating capital as being a more serious obstacle to expansion in their world than lack
of fixed capital.
.............we assume that surplus labor cannot be used to make consumer goods without using up
more land or capital, but can be used to make capital goods without using any scarce factors. If a
community is short of capital, and has idle resources which can be set to creating capital, it seems
very desirable on the face of the matter that this should be done, even if it means creating extra
money to finance the extra employment……”
[Quoted from W.A.Lewis (1954) ‘Economic Development with Unlimited Supplies of Labor,
Manchester School of Economics and Social Studies. May 22(2): p. 152].
So, it seems Prof. Lewis has provided the strongest possible justification for MNREGA, much
before the scheme was conceptualized.
v
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE 1
INTRODUCTION 3 to 12
REVIEW OF LITERATURE 13 to 17
METHODS & METHODOLOGY 18 to 20
FINDINGS & INTERPRETATIONS 21 to 68
SUMMARY & CONCLUSION 69 to 76
FUTURE SCOPE OF RESEARCH 77 to 79
BIBLIOGRAPHY 81 to 84
LIST OF TABLES
vi
Table 1: The Timeline of MNREGA
Table 2: The rural hhds requiring the running up of MNREGA
Table 3: Agrarian structure of Cooch Behar
Table 4: Distribution of cultivable lands among labour households
Table 5: The number of respondents selected from every Gram Panchayat
Table 6: Demand for wage-employment in Cooch Behar
Table 7: Years in which MNREGA got actually carried out
Table 8: Average number of person-days generated per house-hold & per job-card
Table 9: Gram Panchayat wise performance in the generation of employment
Table 10: Expenditure per Gram Panchayat
Table 11: Types of works carried out in Gram Panchayats
Table 12: Arbitrary nature of work implementation under MNREGA
Table 12: Bank and Postal Accounts opened under MNREGA
Table 13: Number of first time account holders in the sample.
Table 14: The prevailing level of awareness among the masses
Table 15: Assessment of difficulties faced by the locals
Table 16: Demand and lean periods of MNREGA
Table 17: Comparison between farm works and works under MNREGA
Table 18: Distance of the MNREGA’ work-site from the dwellings
Table 19: Delays in wage-payments
Table 20: Conductance of Social Audits in Cooch Behar
Table 21 Accessibility level of MIS in Cooch Behar
Table 22: Establishment of MNREGA cell
Table 23: Inappropriate wage rates
Table 24: Utilization of funds by the Gram Panchayats
Table 25: Responses of GPs for slack in fund utilization
Table 26: Material costs incurred by the Gram Panchayats
Table 27: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Pundibari
Table 28: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Madhupur
Table 29: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Dhangdhinguri
Table 30: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Patlakhawa
Table 31: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Deoanhat
Table 32: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Ghughumari
Table 33: Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Sukthabari
Table 34: Number of working days and the wages earned by the hhds in Panishala
Table 35: Average amount of wage payment of a household in the sample
Table 36: Pattern of utilization of wage payments
Table 37: Expenditure Pattern in agricultural activities
Table 38: Tangible assets purchased
Table 39: Perceived Changes in Socio-economic Parameters
Table 40: Migration in Cooch Behar
Table 41: Types of works done by in the places of migration
Table 42: Income earned in the places of migration
Table 43: Participation of women in MNREGA
Table 44: Allocation in Union Budget on Employment Schemes
Table 45: Percentage of rural hhds completing one hundred days of employment
Table 46: Performance of Cooch Behar in MNREGA
vii
Figure 1: The promise of MNREGA
Figure 2: Profile of the contact-members
Figure 3: Process of MNREGA implementation.
Figure 4: Average number of days of employment per household
Figure 5: Average expenditure per Gram Panchayat
Figure 6: Types of MNREGA woks done in Cooch Behar
Figure 7: The workload involved in MNREGA
Figure 8: Consequences of improper fund utilization
Figure 9: Average material costs incurred in West Bengal
Figure 10: District- wise participation of women in MNREGA works
Figure 11: The performance of MNREGA so far
viii
1. PRI - Panchayati Raj Institution
2. LP - Local Panchayat
3. MANAGE - National Institute of Agricultural Extension and Management.
4. EGA – Employment Guarantee Act of Bombay Province ( Maharashtra)
5. GP - Gram Panchayat.
6. MNREGA – Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act.
7. CEGC – Central Employment Guarantee Council.
8. SEGC – State Employment Guarantee Council.
9. UA – Unemployment Allowance.
10. VLW - Village Level Worker.
11. SA – Social Audits
12. SROI – Social Recovery Operative Investment.
13. MR - Muster Rolls.
14. PEO- Panchayat Executive Officer.
15. DEO- Data Entry Operator.
16. MIS – Management and Information system.
17. CB – Cooch Behar.
18. WB – West Bengal.
19. MS – Measurement Sheet.
20. UC – Utilization Certificate.
21. DP – District Panchayat
22. SGRY- Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana
23. NFWP – National Food for Work Programme.
24. SOR – Schedule Of Rates
25. RH – Rural Households.
26. RLH- Rural Labour Households.
27. SRI – System of Rice Intensification.
28. VCMs – Village Council Meetings.
29. hhd - Household
PROLOGUE
ix
According to the Seventh report of the Rural Labour Enquiry (Labour Bureau,
2004) there were 13.7 crore rural households (RH) in the country in 1999-2000,
of which 5.51 crore RH were rural labour households (RLH). Projecting that the
number RLH to grow at an annual compound rate of 1.93 per cent (the national
growth rate of population between 1991 and 2001) we get a figure of 8.42 crore
RLH in the country by April 2010. Understandably, the RLH form a large chunk
in the country.
Since, of all the sections of population it’s the RLH which are more
disadvantageous to escape poverty and so poverty alleviation schemes are set to
enhance their livelihood security. MNREGA was scripted to do more to such
rural households by providing at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment
in a financial year to all households whose adult members volunteer to do
unskilled manual work.
This scheme is different from earlier schemes because while the earlier ones did
not provide any guarantee of job, this makes job providence a legal right which
can be contested. No responsibility could be fixed upon the official concerned
for doing the needful in earlier schemes, while this scheme ensures providing
jobs as a legal right (Abhay Singh, 2008).
Well, this may not be a novel Act of providing job guarantee; as such an attempt
was made by the Government of Bombay, now Maharashtra, in 1966 itself. Yet,
this guarantee for wage employment is now uniformed all over the country like
never before.
Thus, it is abundantly clear that this is not a welfare programme dishing out
doles (Vijay Shankar, 2008). It is a development initiative, chipping in with
crucial public investment for creation of durable assets, without which the
growth process will not get the requisite momentum in the most backward
regions of rural India. Its emphasis on water conservation, drought-and-flood-
proofing is also critical as it underscores water security as the pre-requisite and
foundation for rural transformation.
But what is of vital necessity for the success of MNREGA is raising the
awareness of the people. Those for whom the Act was passed should practically
‘own’ it or otherwise, it will go down in the foot-notes of India’s history as
another item in the wish-list of the top politicians, bureaucrats and academicians
and sincere souls of struggling India.
x
INTRODUCTION
xi
2
“To be the same is not going to be your question,
But it is going to be your answer.” (Lakshmi Priya Halan)
1.0 Introduction: The water had not turned into wine, but happy bells
started to jingle when MNREGA in its earlier avatar as NREGA (National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act) got passed in the parliament with thumping
majority in 2005, as rural distress was growing rapidly at the time the Act was
passed. The growth of agricultural production fell from 3.5 per cent in the 1980s
to 2.0 per cent per annum in the 1990s (the latest edition of Economic Survey
puts it at 1.1 per cent in the last fiscal year), and real income growth fell from
4.5 to 2.5 per cent per annum over the same period. By 2008, per capita food
grain availability had fallen to lower than that in the 1950s. Workforce
participation rates in rural areas declined, more for women than men. The
Planning Commission reports a fall in employment growth from 2.04 per cent
during 1983-94 to 0.98 per cent during 2000-2008. Even though this was
accompanied by a deceleration in the rate of growth of the labour force from
2.29 per cent in 1987-94 to 1.03 per cent in 2003-2008, unemployment has
grown since labour force growth outstrips the growth of employment.
xii
etc.) with fair prices and the Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) are very fine instances
of this type. But MNREGS is a Universal Programme in which “any rural
household whose adult member/s volunteer/s to do unskilled marginal work”
gets qualified for wage employment.
Other Wage
Issue Employment Programmes MNREGA
Status Programme Statute
Labour Any one can be engaged as Only Job Cards holders that apply
labour for employment
Time frames None Employment within 15 days of
demand,
Payment within 15 days of work
xiii
50%-GP
The following Table 1 portrays the timeline of MNREGA whereby the scheme
got its modifications during the years of its running.
As the Table 1 depicts, when the scheme got first introduced in 200 most
backward districts of the country in February 2006, it was proposed to have this
scheme extended to the remaining districts only after five years, after seeing the
popularity of the scheme. But the very next year itself the scheme was extended
further to 130 more districts and within months after that the scheme got
universalized by bringing the entire country under its purview and got soon
named after Mahatma Gandhi (in October 2nd 2009) to make the scheme more
reachable to the masses and thus became Mahatma Gandhi National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) for life.
xiv
1. To provide up to one hundred days of guaranteed employment in a financial
year, on demand, to every household in the rural areas, registered under the Act.
3. To guarantee grievance redressal within seven days, social audit twice a year,
proactive disclosure and mandatory transparency.
xv
Source: Guidelines of MNREGA, 2009.
xvi
The responsibility of implementing the scheme in letter and spirit is divided
among various entities of administration, as given under:
(i) Gram Sabha: Responsible for Planning and Selection of works, according priority to
works and for conducting Social Audits.
(ii) Gram Panchayat: Responsible for preparation of plan for the scheme implementation,
registration of workers, providing Job Card to workers, payment of wages and monitoring
the performance of programme in its locality.
(iii) Programme Officer: Responsible for planning for the Block, integrating village-wise
plans, allotment of works, implementation of Programme and providing the employment and
to provide Unemployment Allowance.
(iv)District Programme Coordinator: Responsible for overall planning in the district and
coordination and implementation in the District.
The figure 1 given below gives a glimpse of how MNREGA could be seen to
render rural transformation for the good of the country as a whole.
xvii
Figure 1: The promise of MNREGA
during
non- agricultural period
lifestyle
improvement
providing jobs
in the locality itself
increase in
standard of living
PROMISE OF
MNREGA more disposable
amount of money
diversified
consumption pattern
improved
spending pattern people spend more
1.2 Need for such a scheme: Now we have got to know, whether a
scheme like MNREGA is needed at all in the first place. If the scheme promises
so many things, is it possible for all such promises to get fulfilled? Who are
going to be the beneficiaries of the scheme? Or in fact, for whom the scheme is
actually for. Who are to be the target population for the scheme? Is there a
section of population in every village for whom the scheme would mean a lot of
significance and who, by all means, need such a scheme for running their very
livelihoods? In what proportions the intended beneficiaries of the scheme are
present in the villages and what is their economical position in the villages and if
the scheme is implemented at all, how benefited would be the beneficiary for
whom the scheme is intended for.
xviii
In West Bengal, the picture is not colourful (Raghuraman, 2009). With the
State’s poverty ratio lying a little above 50 % and all the six districts of North
Bengal, one among them being Cooch Behar on which this dissertation is
constructed, fall in the ratio between 40 and 60 % in terms of poverty.
The rural poverty line, which is now in the approximate region of Rs. 400 per
capita per month means that an average household that is below the poverty line
(BPL) will have income of something in the range of Rs. 24,000 per annum or
less, assuming a five- member household.
In other words, if a BPL family were to get full promised benefit of MNREGA
then they could earn the equivalent of more than 40 per cent of their annual
income from this scheme alone. And if every individual of any assumed rural
BPL family manages to get wage employment for hundred full days, then that
family would earn more than twice of what it could earn with its regular
occupation.
And coming to farmer’s households, the poverty alleviation schemes are much
needed for them as the estimates of the planning commission put them in a bitter
economic position than all the rural households of a locality. This refers to those
households which are involved in farming majorly as labourers, with marginal
holdings to work at, with little diversification of farming in them, with no
secondary occupation, with much little opportunities to look elsewhere and
remaining with no or less work to do during off-season.
Under such conditions, MNREGA seems to be the best scheme that a poor rural
farm labourer’s household could ever wished for.
In whatever way, we may picturise a farmers’ household one thing is stark clear:
Among the rural households, it’s the farmers’ households which are always
identified with poverty by all the commissions so far, and they are in a high risk
situation to not to get out from the poverty-trap as easily like other rural
households.
xix
So, this scheme may be needed for them. But it would do good to see how much
is the constitution of farmers’ households among rural households to have an
idea about the appeal that MNREGA could create, if implemented. The
following table 2 exactly tries to surmise upon this idea.
The Monthly Per Capita Expenditure (MPCE) shows how much a family
consumes. With lower the level of expenditure, lower will have to be the areas
of spending as the family will be left with fewer options to allocate the needs,
for want of money. Situational Assessment Survey (SAS) of the Planning
Commission (2008) shows that the average monthly per capita expenditure
(MPCE) for farmer households at all- India level, during the year 2008, was Rs.
503 compared to Rs. 554 for all rural households. Thus, once again, it drives the
point that the schemes like MNREGA are needed among those regions where
farmers’ households form a major chunk with MPCE lower than other
households.
The Table 2 puts farmers’ households in larger proportions among all rural
households. That too in Cooch Behar, the percentage farmer’s households
crosses both the nation’s and state’s average. Plus, in Cooch Behar the level of
indebtedness is alarming larger. So, there is high chance for such schemes like
MNREGA to become a sudden river in a ridden desert, only if properly
implemented.
But not all the farmers’ households can be categorized as poor. Fair, this is a
point not to argue with. And, MNREGA scheme is not just for the poor farmers’
xx
households but the BPL rural households in general. This means that it is
important to see the share of poor rural households, to understand the need of the
scheme. The Table 2 demonstrates the poor rural households in higher
proportions the country over, especially Cooch Behar topping the charts. So,
MNREGA if gets implemented could serve as a fall-back employment source.
The above assumptions hammer in the point that a scheme like MNREGA is
very much needed for those rural regions which are predominantly agricultural
and where,
If we could see whether any of the conditions tally with the ground reality of
Cooch Behar, then we can certainly ascertain that a scheme of such a magnitude
like MNREGA fits the bill, and if it gets introduced and implemented effectively
it will be the people who will call the shots.
xxi
2. <1 37.89
3.
1<3 12.89
Source: Agrarian Bengal: Economy, Social Structure and Politics by Bose
(2001)
Table 4 suggests that about nearly half of the agricultural households owned no
land; they are landless agricultural labourers. 37.89 per cent of the total
agricultural households owned below one acre of land that is uneconomical for
cultivation. Here, thereby, the district of Cooch Behar makes a strong case for
the need of schemes like MNREGA.
1.3 Objectives of the study: Thus more than anything else, Cooch
Behar is pre-dominantly rural in nature. The Census Estimates say that more
than 80 percent of the house-holds reside in the rural areas. And of them 72
percent are either directly or indirectly involved in agriculture or allied
activities. Moreover, the rural farm-labour work force touches a staggering 52
percent of the total agricultural populace (table 2), thus forming the major bulk.
Though cropping intensity stands at 177 percent, many parts in Cooch Behar are
still mono-cropped, with little or less diversification in agricultural activities.
Thus, the district seems to be perfectly qualified for a scheme like MNREGA,
which gives right to the people to demand any skilled or unskilled work that
could be done in their very own locality thereby ultimately leading to the
development of their society as a whole, in terms of improvisation of living
conditions.
If such is the case, then it would be of interest to study the durable assets created
and conservational works undertaken because of implementation of MNREGA
as this very scheme is set to achieve the over-all improvement of the
infrastructure of every functioning village in terms of physical, conservational
and ecological through the use of manual labour.
Moreover, though Cooch Behar is not a degraded area, over the decades large
scale migration has taken place. If Rs. 400 per capita per month, as claimed by
the Planning Commission, is enough to support the basic livelihood wants, then
the maximum wages that the MNREGA guarantees in full-implementation ( i.e.,
Rs.10,000) for a house-hold can come up to nearly 40 % of the annual income of
a household as a whole. This could act as a good incentive for the migrants to
xxii
return to their folds and start working in the local schemes. Even then, if the
migrants are not returning then it’s an all together different scenario that makes
up another interesting study.
Thus, in view of above observations, an attempt has been made in this study to
conduct a farm/micro level survey with the following specific objectives:
A. Importance of MNREGA
xxiii
*Differences between a Needs-based Approach and a
Rights-based Approach
• Looking at the basic needs of the poorer section of the country, Anish
Vanaik (2009) puts his observation that the Act (MNREGA) which
guarantees one hundred days of employment per household at minimum
wages is the first piece of legislation that compels the State to provide a
social safety net for the improvised households and thereby deserves a
special place among all the poverty alleviation schemes so far.
xxiv
B. Impacts of MNREGA
• Scanning all the regions that need a scheme like MNREGA to the
immediate effect, Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (2009) opines that
MNREGA addresses, the ‘geography of poverty’ as it generates higher
employment in the most deprived areas. So far the works taken up
number to: 8.3 lakh and completed works: 3.8 lakh and works in
progress: 4.5 lakh.
• After seeing the running up of the scheme in all over the years of its
implementation, Lalit Mathur (2008) apprehends that the improprieties
that have come to be associated with any poverty alleviation scheme of
the Government of India have not left the scheme alone.
• Adding more force to the running stream, Abhay Singh (2008) cites the
evidence that many inspection teams were not able to locate the ponds
that were allegedly dug under the scheme (MNREGA).
xxv
• The very important thing for MNREGA is the periodic assessment of
performance. And this comes though regular conductance of Social
Audits, for at least twice a year as put by the guidelines of the scheme.
But Amitabh Behr (2008) is of the opinion that in West Bengal the
progress towards Social Audits (SAs) has been shoddy at best which
betrays the entire set up.
• Reetikha Khera (2008) comes up with a valid point to show the level of
impropriety that is existent when she underlines that job-cards in Orissa
and in some other states like West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh do not have
a column for recording wages paid to labourers. Thereby the
beneficiaries will not be able to track down the wage amount that is due
to them.
xxvi
transacted through accounts, makes her observation that the bank
accounts make payments more expensive and not feasible.
• Zeroing in on the slack in demand for works under MNREGA all over
the country, and especially with the case of larger states, Magsaysay
award winner Sainath (2009) comments that most of the government
officials do not give publicity to the scheme as they want to show that
labour is not certainly available. For instance, the following table shows
the number of rural households in the district of Cooch Behar and the
very low number of households that demanded works under MNREGA.
Total HH
rural Demanding
District
HH Employment
(lakh) (lakh)
• On finding some of the states evidently paying less than the promised
statutory minimum wage, Jean Dreze (2009) cautions that it amounts to
flagrant violation of the act.
D. Future scope
xxvii
• Total number of Operational Holdings in the category of small and
marginal farmers (SF, MF) i.e., those owning less than 2hectares or 5
acres: 537.21lacs as per the statistical Hand Book of Directorate of
Economics and Statistics of the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of
India. To make MNREGA a better deal for the underprivileged small and
medium farmers who were untouched by the first Green Revolution of
the 1960s, Jean Dreze (2010) favours that by working with smaller and
poorer farmer households MNREGA can aim in stimulating the
productivity levels to a significant account and thereby leading to
another food revolution.
xxviii
6. Convergence for sustainable livelihood 6. Building up a complementary system for
opportunities: “Convergence for livelihood improving productivity and net incomes:
was an approach that was taken right from “The issue at stake is how do we build
the very beginning in Madhya Pradesh. We NREGA into a system that complements the
are using NREGA and drawing from the existing production systems, the small
resources of other schemes to create farmers and the livestock traders and
sustainable opportunities for the poor.” – improves their productivity and net
Rashmi Shami incomes.” – A Ravindra
Source: Pradan (2009): “NREGA - Beyond Wages to Sustainable Livelihoods”:
Report of a Workshop organized by National Resource Centre for Rural Livelihoods on
November 21, 2009 in New Delhi.
METHODS
&
METHODOLOGIES
xxix
3.0 SURVEY: The study was undertaken in the following steps which
were reflective as well as conclusive in nature. The first step involved review of
literature and identification of issues and concerns. This was supplemented by
an analysis of secondary data pertaining to MNREGA and related matters
available from Ministry of Rural Development website and other secondary
sources. The next step involved collection of primary data from a random
sample of households. For that Sample survey was conducted in two blocks of
Cooch Behar district namely Cooch Behar I and Cooch Behar II. From each
block, four Gram Panchayats were selected thereby selection totaling up to eight
Gram Panchayats in all. These Gram Panchayats have been considered as the
unit of location from which respondents (here sample farmers/beneficiaries)
were purposively chosen for survey works. Ten persons who happen to be the
beneficiaries of the MNREGA programme were contacted from each of the
Gram Panchayat. So, the sample size was 80 (eighty). But other beneficiaries of
the households, apart from the 80 contact members were also considered for
study. The details of the sample have been provided in the Table 5 and Figure
2.
#) They are the beneficiaries of the scheme at least for the past two years of its
operation.
#) They get benefited from the scheme in the form of maximum number of days
of wage employment that the GP offered so far during the operational years
between 2007 and 2010.
xxx
# FROM COOCH BEHAR II
1. PUNDIBARI 10 17 27
2. MADHUPUR 10 05 15
3. DANGDINGGURI 15 13 28
# FROM COOCH BEHAR I
4. PATLAKHAWA 10 04 14
5. DEOANHAT 15 12 27
6. GHUGHUMARI 10 17 27
7. SUKTAHBARI 15 13 28
8. PANISHALA 10 10 20
TOTAL
# 95 86 181
Local migrants-05
As far as possible, the households chosen were kept in such a way to reflect all
the walks of life of a rural society (as shown in figure 2). That’s why the
surveyed 80 (eighty) contact members were a cocktail, compromising land-
owners, farm labourers, migrants, non-agricultural households and households
xxxi
doing agricultural works as part time activity with main occupation being some
other.
The focus was kept to determine the impact of MNREGA in the rural society as
a whole. And the expressions and suggestions of the other beneficiaries of the
household, apart from the member-in-contact, were also taken note by staging
mock group interviews as and when necessary as demanded by the methodology
set.
Tools for analysis: The collected data from the survey works have been
compiled according to the aim of the study. Usually tabular forms of analyses
were followed to arrive at interpretation of the findings so derived from the
micro level. Besides, different secondary sources of information were also
consulted to make comparative study as well as conclusion therein.
In view of conducting the sample survey, a structured schedule was prepared for
interview purpose keeping all aspects of the objectives of the study. Focused
group interviews with the members and beneficiaries of the rural households
were also carried out to ascertain the required data on the following issues like:
i) impact of MNREGA on migration
ii) women empowerment & MNREGA and
iii) impact of MNREGA upon agricultural activities.
FINDINGS
AND
INTERPRETATIONS
xxxii
4.0 DEMAND FOR EMPLOYMENT UNDER MNREGA:
MNREGA is basically a demand driven programme. Actual provision of
employment is based on demand expressed by the registered persons at the
Gram Panchayat. According to the mandate of MNREGA, there should be a
need of demand for work from at least ten persons to start up a new work for
providing employment. The following table 6 deals with the demand for work
under MNREGA in the Cooch Behar district.
Table 6 shows the finding of low demand for work under MNREGA, among the
registered house-holds. One of the reasons for low demand for work may be less
local participation, which in turn may be due to lack of awareness prevailing
among people for MNREGA. There may be also some other reasons for low
demand for wage-employment. For instance during the survey works in the
xxxiii
Gram Panchayat (GP) offices, it was possible to interact with the officials, in
charge of MNREGA implementation, browsing on this topic and it was gathered
that when an applicant demands work in writing by submitting Form B-1 (work
application or demand form) to the Panchayat, the rule requires that the
application has to be acknowledged in writing by the Panchayat through the
issue of notice to the applicant for reporting to work (Form B-2). But this
process is quite difficult and clumsy. That too when the Gram Panchayats has to
face up with shortage of staff, the process becomes burdensome.
So Form B-2 is not given to the applicants seeking jobs. It is kept with the
Panchayat itself. Since there is no record for demand of works it becomes
possible for the Gram Panchayats to allocate works on their own discretion and
to show data and reports in their convenient angles. The most important
drawback of this kind of set up is that the scheme ceases to be a demand based
on and begins to exist in the form of supply based programme like any poverty
alleviation scheme.
This may also be one of the reasons for low participation from the locals. But
the participation of the people is vital, as the scheme’s founding fathers have
very heavily based their entire faith on decentralization and local participation
for the scheme to achieve its intended targets.
The following figure 3 show how important is the demand for employment from
the people which forms the basement for the entire scheme to run. In fact, as the
figure 3 shows the participation of people in the running up of MNREGA at all
levels, begins with their very demand for work in the primary level.
xxxiv
FORM 4 A
FORM 4 B
recruitment
opening
JOB-CARD ISSUE accounts
COLLECTORATE
xxxv
As Table 6 revealed less demand for works under MNREGA from the local
people,Table 7 shows that the works were not carried out in the Gram
Panchayats in all the years of implementation of the scheme. In all the eight GPs
that were studied there is at least one full year in which the scheme was kept
dormant with little or no activity at all.
2. MADHUPUR
3. DHANGDHINGURI
4. PATLAKHAWA
5. DEOANHAT
6. GHUGHUMARI
7. SUKTAHBARI
8. PANISHALA
xxxvi
Note: The tick marks in the table stands for
the years in which MNREGA works were carried out.
Table 8: Average number of person-days generated per house-hold & per job-
card
during the financial years 2006-2007, 2007-2008 & 2008-2009 &
2009-2010
xxxvii
per house-hold per job-card
1. 2006-2007 32 18 - 39 22 -
2. 2007-2008 43 27 12 45 29 17
3. 2008-2009 25 19 10 37 23 15
4. 2009-2010 35 21 08 42 27 13
Source: Jean Dreze & Christian Oldgies (2010) and data collected from
www.nrega.nic.in
1. PUNDIBARI 15 19 14 18
2. MADHUPUR 12 15 06
3. DHANGDHINGURI 14 19 11 17
4. PATLAKHAWA
08 10 07
5. DEOANHAT 14 19 12 18
6. GHUGHUMARI 13 16 09
SUKTAHBARI 06 15 14 17
7.
PANISHALA 06 11 14 19
8.
(Note: The black boxes indicate the years in which the scheme was not run).
xxxviii
Figure 4 indicates the performance of Cooch Behar in generating number of
days of employment per household and the figure compares the performance
with the levels of performances of other districts of the state. From the presented
figure 6 it can be resented that as the average of the state is 26 days of
employment generation per rural household, our Cooch Behar lags behind by
generating only 15 days of employment and takes a penultimate place in terms
of performance.
Source: www.nrega.nic.in
The reason for the decline in the providence of works was attributed to the
holding of Panchayat elections during the year 2008. It was also said by the
officials of the Gram Panchayats that it took time for the newly elected
Panchayat bodies to get oriented and start functioning the MNREGA
programme. In addition to these, migration to payment through accounts instead
of paying through cash also resulted in initial difficulty.
xxxix
3.3 EXPENDITURE PER GRAM PANCHAYAT: Gram Panchayat (GP) is the
most important unit of local government in respect of MNREGA, since the
responsibility of issuing Job Cards after registering the households (that demand
employment) and providing employment on demand are the responsibilities of the
GPs. Expenditure per GP of a district is very important as it discusses the
effectiveness of fund allocation by the concerned districts. It also tells to a
loathsome extent of how the funds were utilized, on what factors the funds were
spent and much more about whether the funds got utilized in such a way as it is
required by the mandate on which the programme was verily framed.
xl
So, it can be inferred as a good indicator taking that Cooch Behar could have
performed more by MNREGA than many other districts in West Bengal as its
spending is high. But it may also be referred that in any case percentage
expenditure of available fund is not however the right indicator in a demand
driven programme like the MNREGA as more important is the availability of
funds at the time of works getting carried out.
xli
sector polices in the form of special component plans/schemes for the poor and
disadvantaged to accommodate their basic material and capability-building
needs started from the late 1970s and early 1980s onwards and this got itself
well established in the MNREGA programme as the works that are permissible
under the scheme are purposively meant for the creation of local infrastructure:
(vii) Flood control and protection works including drainage in water logged
areas
(ix) Any other work which may be notified by the Central Government in
consultation with the State Government. For instance, awareness about the
practice of System of Rice Intensification (SRI) technique in rice was given
to the farmers over various parts of Orissa. Such-like cases which are found
to be especially suitable for a locality can also be routed through proper
channels to get acceptance from the administration.
xlii
Source: As per the details provided by the MNREGA Cell of Cooch Behar.
MNREGA, when framed, was envisaged to help in the resuscitation of rural
livelihoods. This could only be possible if the works under MNREGA leave a
long term impact in the locality by creating durable assets for the society as a
whole. Such kinds of asset generation would help in the strengthening of rural
infrastructure on one-hand and on the other hand they focus on improving the
standards of life of rural society. Moreover, there is also a chance for fostering
conservational aspects in the conventional agricultural practices through
MNREGA.
But here in Cooch Behar, as fig.6 shows, maximum number of MNREGA works
was allotted under rural road and repair and refurnish. Road works require less
planning and is one of the easiest and safest things to get allotted. But to start-up
works on conservational aspects which lead to the creation of durable assets a lot
of planning is required. This is the reason for why MNREGA mandate
necessarily stress the Gram Panchayats to keep shelf of plans ready before
commencing the scheme in a financial year.
xliii
S.N
Name of the Works undertaken
o.
Gram Panchayat under MNREGA
1. PUNDIBARI 1, 2, 3, 5
2. MADHUPUR 1, 5
3. DANGDINGGURI 1
4. PATLAKHAWA 1
5. DEOANHAT 1, 5
6. GHUGHUMARI 1, 2, 4
7. SUKTAHBARI 1
8. PANISHALA 1
xliv
No. of times MNREGA works
getting detailed or at least
brought up in the VCMs
GRAM
S.No.
PANCHAYAT
2007 2008- 2009-
-2008 2009 2010
7. SUKTAHBARI 0 (-) 0 ( 17 ) 0 ( 14 )
Note: The figures inside parentheses indicate the total number of days of
employment
per household in a financial year.
iii) MNREGA prescribes that the work stretch should not exceed, 14 days at a
time. But this regulation was also not paid any heed.
xlv
Bank Postal Total accounts
accounts accounts opened between 2007
between between and 2010
2007 &2010 2007 & 2010
1,75,482 2,43,162 4,18,644
Source: From the reports submitted by the State government in the
legislative assembly between the financial years 2007 and 2010.
The Rangarajan Committee on financial Inclusion had noted that 45.9 million
households (51 %) of the total 89.3 million households do not access credit from
the institutional sources. The aim of the National Rural Financial Inclusion Plan
is to provide access, by 2012, to financial services for an estimated 5.5 crore
households that are currently deprived of any credit. So MNREGA could be
seen as a good wagon for furthering financial inclusion among rural masses.
Apart from ensuring transparency in payments, the accounts in banks and post-
offices also acts as an incentive for thrift and small savings ( Lalit Mathur,
2008).
In our study the questions were raised to ascertain the number of account holders
in the sample who did not hold any previous account and got them opened for
the first time through MNREGA. The following table 13 elaborates the details
obtained.
But it was also found out that the opening of accounts in banks and post-offices
and thereby facilitating wage-payments through them lead to many adverse
effects. The main problem was delay in wage-payments. People in many GPs
had to wait for more a month and some more than two months after the
completion of works to get the payments. Moreover, the Post Offices and Banks
run in their own restricted space and in their face-off with the MNREGA
beneficiaries some unremarkable incidents did happen. Moreover the transaction
of wages through banks and post-offices made people to go in groups and
xlvi
received payments in bulk which further created some more scope for
embezzlement.
Table 13: Number of first time account holders in the sample.
1. PUNDIBARI 3 30%
2. MADHUPUR 5 50%
3. DHANGDHINGURI 7 70%
4. PATLAKHAWA 6 60%
5. DEOANHAT 8 80%
6. GHUGHUMARI 5 50%
7. SUKTAHBARI 10 100%
8. PANISHALA 7 70%
It can be said that the very success of MNREGA largely depends upon the
awareness of it among the masses for whom the programme is intended for.
When the people are aware about the existence of the scheme then they would
xlvii
come forward to the Gram Panchayats to enquire about the scheme. Then the
GPs could help in getting their queries cleared. So the people could place their
demands. And the works would get allotted. If these take place in their order –
as every one of these is interlinked- the programme becomes successful. Any
breakup in the order means that the Gram Panchayat is not able to run the
programme as it is supposed to run.
The objective of the awareness schedule was intended to find out whether the
people were self propelled to perform the work or did they simply accept what
was in offer. If the demand from the people is self-propelled, then it would lead
to two conclusions: First of all, the people of that particular Gram Panchayat
(GP) are very well aware of the programme that is running in their villages. And
the GP is also effective in making the people to become aware of the benefits of
the programme. Secondly, the people are in need of jobs or at least they have got
some free time to dispense with, which they could profitably use in earning their
livelihoods to improve their standard of living. The following table 14
effectively illustrates the indicators that were used for the study and the response
of the sample, GP wise.
xlviii
A Badaga proverb says, “Wishes never wash dishes”. The same seems to be true
with the people who were contacted for the survey. All of them wished for such
a scheme, but when they heard about it- no one seemed it fair enough to inquire
about the scheme by themselves in the Gram Panchayats thus perfectly making
it a ‘supply based programme’. Only a handful responded affirmatively
confirming their knowledge about Village Council Meetings and almost all seem
to be in their best negligent mood when it comes to having the knowledge about
various entitlements that the scheme guarantees one.
Assessing the local participation: So it is said that the scheme in entirety
is based upon two main objectives: decentralization and local participation.
MNREGA structure expects this participation from the locals to happen on every
front – right from planning of works to implementation to facilitating social
audits.
In Cooch Behar as MNREGA is being in operation for over three years, the study
expected the participation from the people on the fronts including:
With all the above mentioned considerations the study was set to gauge the local
participation in every Gram Panchayat. The households were questioned about
their participation. And it was found that there is no clear difference in the
perception of people between MNREGA and any other poverty alleviation
schemes that were in run so far. It was also noticed that there is also lack of
expertise in the Gram Panchayats to choose works, if at all, which could build
durable assets. The following Table 15 shows the set of parameters that were
put forth to the beneficiaries to reason out their level of participation in the
scheme and the difficulties they came to see in the functioning of the scheme
which by the way hampered their effective participation.
xlix
Table 15 Assessment of difficulties faced by the locals
S.NO DIFFICULTIES PUND MADH DHANGD PATLA DEON GHUGU SUKTHA P
FACED UP BARI UPUR HINGURI KHAWA AHAT MARI BARI SH
1. Irregular employment
*
2. Jobs not popular
May be the irregularities that happened, in creating and providing jobs, rest
wholly with the Gram Panchayats. But the locals also failed to appreciate the
nature of the scheme which is actually based upon their willingness to demand
for works.
4.2 Seasonal pattern of demand for works: A study of the
seasonal pattern all over the country in the demand for work under MNREGA
shows that the July – October period is the lean period while May-June is the
peak period. While there may be other factors, the monsoon and the kharif crop
seem to have a major role to play in providing farm employment opportunities
during the July- October period and hence reducing the demand for employment
under MNREGA.
To observe the seasonal pattern of farm-activities i.e. the months in which the
people whose main occupation is farming involve in it in such a way that they
would not be able to dispose their time off for any kind of special activities that
are not on their routine like MNREGA questions were raised to the contact-
members of the households which were interviewed. And when the need arose,
mock interviews were also staged in the respective households, to gauge the
intensity of participation of other members of the households in farm activities
and their free time off.
l
Hectic farm Lean period of Period of no or
S.No. GRAM PANCHAYAT work period farm work nil farm work
From the table 16, we can ascertain that the months of January, February,
March, April and December of a cropping season are found to be suitable for
works under MNREGA, as in these months there is comparatively less farm
works happening around in the GPs.
jan feb mar april may june july august sep oct nov dec
(The shaded months signify common months of less or little farm activities in
Gram Panchayats)
4.3 Farm work & MNREGA work- A Comparison: The seasonal pattern
of works revealed that farm people who form the majority in Cooch Behar and
constitute most of the rural poor households for whom this entire scheme is
mean for, can relieve themselves off regular farming for nearly four months in a
year which works out to be sufficient for carrying out MNREGA successfully
without omitting any of its desired mandates.
But our findings reveal that the participation of the people is very low (see
Table 16). So there could be two basic reasons for this state of affairs. One:
Gram Panchayats themselves failing to have the scheme implemented or,
otherwise: people finding the scheme too much inconvenient.
li
Table 17 : Comparison between farm works and works under MNREGA
Distance of the work site: Distance of work sites from dwellings of the people
who were interviewed for the sample is given in the table 18.
The contact-member and all the other beneficiaries of the ten households that
were interviewed in the GPs were asked to give an approximate distance of what
they felt that the distance of work-site was, when they attended MNREGA’
works during the previous season. If their response indicated distance exceeding
more than 5 kms, they were further casually questioned the means employed by
them to reach for their work-site, as MNREGA guidelines prescribe vehicles to
be arranged to ferry people to their work-sites if the distance exceed five kms
from the dwellings of the beneficiaries. The intention of the study was to find
out whether people gave up their need to do MNREGA’ works just because of
frustration that might have resulted from too much distant the worksites happen
to be.
lii
Gram Panchayat from the dwelling
(in km)
1. PUNDIBARI
5 – 10
5 -15
2. MADHUPUR
3. DANGDINGGURI 5-15
4. PATLAKHAWA 5 - 10
5. 10 - 15
DEWANHAT
6. GHUGHUMARI 10 – 15
7. SUKTAHBARI 5 – 15
8. PANISHALA 5 – 15
Generally, the interviewed people didn’t have any problems with the distance of
the work-sites from their dwellings. In some cases, even vehicles were arranged
to ply people to their work-sites but that was not provided in all the working-
days. The people under study were much concerned about the wage-payments
they receive and the delays associated with their transaction and are not troubled
by the physical hardships.
liii
PATLAKHAWA (1) (3)
DEOANHAT (1) (2)
GHUGHUMARI (2,3)
SUKTAHBARI (1) (2)
PANISHALA (1) (2)
The numerals given inside parentheses stand for the respective years of scheme
implementation, as given in the following tablet.
1 2 3
2007-2008 2008-2009 2009-2010
The table 19 shows that there are cases in which the wage payments got delayed
for more than two months after work completion, whereas the mandate requires
the payments to get awarded within 7 days of works getting completed.
According to the Gram Panchayats that were interviewed the reasons for delays
lies behind the ground level fact that the critical information about the
attendance of workers, progress of a project and wage payment made against are
not getting relayed on time to all the concerned officials. This slack in the
mechanism makes the payment process getting tough and finally leading to
delays.
Muster rolls are like attendance sheets that record the names of labourers
employed at a particular worksite in a given week, and the wages paid to them.
Muster roll data form the basis for withdrawing money from every Gram
Panchayat’s MNREGA account for the purpose of wage payments.
liv
5.3 Dismal Social Audits: It is the first national programme of
consequence which has woven transparency and accountability into the
mundane fabric of daily interaction of people with government (Aruna Roy,
2008).
The need for conducting Social Audit of all works is another requirement under
MNREGA. A team comprising of an official from the Block, an elected member
of the Gram Panchayat, two representatives from Gram Unnayan Samiti, one
member each from two Class I SHG groups, a representative from a registered
NGO working in the locality can all be included for conducting Social Audits.
The calendar of the dates of social audit of each gram panchayat had to be
announced publicly, approximately one month in advance. But our findings
reveal that such a thing never happened in the Gram Panchayats and the people
are particularly unaware of the existence, meaning and purpose of Social Audits.
Since, this is a relatively new concept the unequal capacity for its conductance
in the Gram panchayats can be understood in the initial period. But since a year
has been passed, the Gram Panchayats remaining with the same standards of
capacity as they were in the initial year of the introduction of Social Audits need
to be oriented suitably.
However, as many as 25% social audits (SA) of the target set have been
conducted in the year 2008-’09 in the whole state. The performance of the
Cooch Behar district with reference to social audits (SA) is given in the Table
20.
Moreover, the Social Audits are not found in the common parlance of the
administration set-up of the Gram Panchayats. Of all the Gram Panchayats, only
lv
Pundibari GP did hold the process of Social Auditing with the involvement of
the people. It becomes also a matter of consideration that the Civil Society
Organizations (CSOs) are not having any presence in the GPs that were
surveyed.
And one of the best ways to make all the documents within the hand-reach of the
aam admi is to use the technology and get all the proceedings computerized and
having the issues and results detailed in the public domain. Thus Information
Technology could play a greater role in making the scheme in achieving all its
set objectives. This is what the concept of MIS set to achieve.
lvi
The fact that information getting speedily available induces transparency and
leaves fewer channels for escape and ensures that the task is done. The fact that
different users have different access and privileges in the system also deters the
possibility of misuse (MANAGE, 2009).
Works getting executed at any village gets identified by the Gram Sabha and
data entered in to input sheets. But our findings reveal that the data regarding
work implementation in Cooch Behar are incomplete and many input sheets
have been kept blank in the MIS. So the standards of MIS have not been met. As
the Table 21 given below, illustrates the level recordings of some of the
important requirements of MNREGA in the public domain thereby making it
easier for the public to access.
The table 21 shows that only 09.50 percent of any works demanded by the
people were reported in the MIS for common access of the people. And more
importantly, only 3.50 percent of all the works undertaken by the scheme got
reported in the MIS. With expenditure that occurred on wage-payments getting
less coverage, the chances of more money being spent on procuring materials
get to alarming proportions. This will hunt down the very essentiality set out by
the scheme: transparency. If the ignorance and inertia of the people not crumbles
lvii
then the urge to improve one’s material conditions would never develop (DEY,
2008).
measurement sheet
muster roll
job-card
identity card
The Gram Panchayats showed that they were ill-equipped with both men and
materials, that becomes the very important consideration which hinders the
otherwise normal and safe and result-oriented implementation with proper ethos
as enunciated in the guidelines that govern the mandate, which forms the very
solid root of MNREGA and without it the whole scheme would lose its
meaning. It would be a pity if such a magnificent initiative flounders only
because we could not have the foresight to invest in its management ( Lalit
Mathur, 2008).
lviii
5.6 Shortage of staff
lix
Thus in the absence of dedicated technical resources, the administrative and
technical scrutiny and approval of works was seen routed through the normal
departmental channels which are already burdened with existing responsibilities.
This was further compounded by the failure to specify time frames for
processing and approval of proposals at different levels. The main deficiency is
the lack of adequate and technical manpower at the Gram Panchayat level as the
Table 22 disposes. Besides affecting the implementation of the scheme and the
provision of employment this also impacts adversely on transparency and
thereby making the verification of the legal guarantee of 100 days of
employment on demand getting difficult.
As a result, the material cost shot-up in the Gram Panchayats (see figure 9 and
table 26) as the unutilized funds were somehow to be utilized. This led to the
deterioration of wage-payments. And even those low wage payments got
delayed as there were a lot of difficulties in transaction (see Table 19) Shortage
in human-resource in the Gram Panchayats made the problems worse. This led
to some Gram Panchayats not carrying out any works at all in the locality (see
Table 9) and people lost interest. Even, Social Audits don’t have any effects as
the Table 20 shows that over three years of implementation of the scheme,
Social Audits have taken place only in two of the Gram Panchayats.
5.5 Delays in administration: The Junior Engineer (JE) has to prepare the
work plans and estimates. Our findings reveal the shortage of staff at such
levels, so every JE present has to bear overloaded responsibility. Once the plan
is made, it is submitted to the Assistant Engineer (AE) for approval. Since each
AE is given the responsibility of more than one block, approval at AE level also
takes extra time. When the AE approves the proposal it is sent to the PO (BDO)
who has powers to approve a plan only up to Rs. 3 lakh.
If the proposal exceeds three lakh rupees, it is sent to the district headquarters.
Once the work is approved and funds released for it, the cheque is signed by the
Sarpanch, the Panchayat EO and the PO-BDO. The shortage of staff at every
level in the district of Cooch Behar makes the process to get extremely delayed.
Once work reaches a certain stage, the work done has to be valuated and
payments made to workers are to be based on this valuation. This requires the
expertise of technical people, who are in short supply throughout the district of
Cooch Behar as the interviewed officials claim. This makes the measurement to
take several months which is supposed to get finished within a week.
lx
respective UCs then the time lapse gets carried forward. This was also cited as
the major reason for the work allotment under MNREGA getting folded up in
the district of Cooch Behar.
There is also general absence of annual plans in the Gram Panchayats, which is
the most important reason for why most of the works get usually done under
rural road construction and repair, as the table 11 and figure 8 show off.
Moreover, wage rate that prevailed during the year 2008-2009 was Rs 75 in the
Gram Panchayats that were surveyed. With effect from 01.01.2008 the wage rate
was raised to Rs 81 (vide order No. 8985(56)-RD/ PAC (SGRY)/175-16/05
dated 29.12.08). However, in all the GPs that were surveyed the implementation
of the revised wage-rate was not seen. When the question was raised to seek the
response for the revisal of wage-payments under the new order from the
officials, it was found out that the carrying out works under MNREGA with
already formulated plans is quite easier but to start works under the new revision
would make the entire procedure cumbersome as all the calculations and
estimations needed to be done again.
2. MADHUPUR - 65 65
3. DANGDINGGURI 60 60 -
4. PATLAKHAWA 65 - 70
5. DEOANHAT 60 58 -
6. GHUGHUMARI - 60 65
7. SUKTAHBARI 58 60
8. PANISHALA 55 60
Note: “msr” stands for Minimum Statutory Requirement of wage payments.
lxi
But the present SORs are meant for a system that uses machines to carry out
public works, while under MNREGA use of machines is completely prohibited.
Thereby, deploying the same SORs under MNREGA makes it impossible for
workers to earn minimum wages (Mihir Shah, 2008).
The MNREGA has an innovative clause for estimation of wages. The wages
paid are based on several factors like minimum wages, gender, the kind of soil
that has to be dug, the depth of the digging and the distance the beneficiary has
to walk to throw the soil from the site of work etc. In other words, they get paid
more for the same amount of work depending on relative hardships at the
worksite.
But all these complex formalities need not be seen at all when as the Table 23
reveals that the wage-payments made by all of the Gram Panchayats are well
below the minimum statutory requirement of wages that have to be necessarily
paid.
lxii
Combined
S.No. Name of the UTILIZATION OF FUNDS percentage
GRAM of
PANCHAYAT 2007 -2008 2008-2009 2009-2010 utilization
Total Fund Total Fund Total Fund of funds
Fund Utilized Fund Utilized Fund Utilized
(Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.)
1. PUNDIBARI 33,86,08 24,16,08 24,69,99 12,88,45 28,65,67 03,22,03 43.16 %
1 7 4 6 1 1
(U+A) (U+A)
2. MADHUPUR 28,55,33 03,18,09 37,66,41 27,28,06 35,38,34 22,17,18 33.28 %
8 7 1 5 6 1
(U+A) (U+A)
3. DANGDINGGURI 27,48,02 14,69,72 20,78,29 8,56,087 12,22,20 07,69,45 38.07 %
2 9 3 6 3
(U+A) (U) + (A)
4. PATLAKHAWA 18,65,00 09,82,33 27,88,06 09,18,00 27,88,05 14,62,67 27.55 %
0 5 3 0 6 6
(U + A) (U+A)
5. DEOANHAT 23,18,09 11,08,12 18,64,14 09,67,07 24,32,89 07,65,40 31.37 %
2 6 7 3 1 0
(U+A) (U+A)
6. GHUGHUMARI 27,08,64 03,28,62 23,80,02 15,76,63 18,79,24 13,76,62 26.82 %
3 1 2 4 3 3
(U+A) (U+A)
7. SUKTAHBARI 17,86,91 09,88,49 22,59,64 11,03,24 15,86,29 07,18,41 18.45 %
9 1 2 3 2 7
(U+A) (U+A)
8. PANISHALA 23,85,61 07,54,62 18,67,34 11,45,61 21,67,61 03,28,19 21.63 %
7 5 2 2 4 7
(U+A) (U+A)
Note: ‘U+A’ refers to Unutilized Fund of the previous year + Allotted Funds
As the table 24 shows the percentage of allotted funds under MNREGA to get
utilized is not up to the mark. Many Gram Panchayats seem to have not utilized
even fifty percentage of the fund that is meant for them.
The question was raised before every Gram Panchayat to know why the allotted
fund was not effectively put in to use. The responses given by the GPs are listed
below in the table 25. Some of the GPs gave over-lapping responses, i.e. the
same response was cited by one or two Gram Panchayats. Such overlapping
responses are also indicated in the table along with other responses.
lxiii
Table 25: Responses of GPs for slack in fund utilization
2. MADHUPUR 6 GHUGHUMARI
.
3. DANGDINGGURI 7 SUKTAHBARI
.
4. PATLAKHAWA 8 PANISHALA
.
Consequences: As Table 24 shows that in the Gram Panchayats fund
utilization for implementing the scheme as not even forty percentage of the
allotted fund with only Pundibari (43.16) and Dhangdhinguri (38.07 %) manage
to come up with decent performance. This whole problem is just like a kick-start
as it can lead to various consequences. Like a vicious cycle each consequence
prevails upon one another and thereby hunting down the very element of the
scheme itself.
The consequences that were felt in the Gram Panchayats have been depicted in
the Figure 8.
lxiv
Figure 8: CONSEQUENCES OF IMPROPER FUND UTILIZATION
Spending more
on materials
than on men People losing
interest
Reworking on the
same site
Less enthusiasm
among GPs
RESULT:
All the desired
outcomes go
unmet.
lxv
MNREGA
lxvi
MNREGA guidelines require that the material cost should not exceed 40 % of
the total cost. In some states the material cost is zero (like Tamil Nadu) and they
do work without any materials or with minimum materials, often it would be the
workers themselves bringing in all the farm implements required for doing all
the digging jobs, requiring high manual labour. That’s why the prevailing wage
rates are considerably high in Tamil Nadu over other states.
But over the years of scheme implementation, Cooch Behar has had to reel
under the spiraling material costs as shown in Figure 9. The material costs of
Cooch Behar are much ahead than the average of the entire state which is an
understandable cost and it is below the permit level of 40 percentage. This huge
material cost is also one of the reasons for revised wage rates, not getting
implemented in many of the Gram Panchayats that were surveyed (see Table 23
for details).
The table 26 shows that the Gram Panchayats also reflect same huge material
costs scenario of the Figure 9.
lxvii
financial years viz., 2007-2008, 2008-2009 & 2009-2010 have already been
passed. In these three years of implementation, there is a definite scope of
MNREGA having an effect directly or indirectly upon the beneficiary
households.
On an average, the wage amount received from MNREGA’ works by the sample
touches a figure of more than Rs.2000 per household over all the three years of
its operation in the Gram Panchayats (see Table 35). The MNREGA’ earnings
form a fair sum and that too earned in less time, ranging from 14 to 22 days of
work on an average, it works out to be a good sum.
Whatever may be the purpose, it would be beneficial to know how the wage-
payments were utilized. By this we can not only guess their spending pattern but
also their level of demand for schemes like MNREGA. Moreover with this look-
out it would be easy to find out the impact of MNREGA on the people, during
the years of its implementation.
The following table 27 illustrates the total number of working days of all the ten
households interviewed in Pundibari and their total wage payment received.
Table 27 - Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Pundibari
lxviii
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
The above table 27 shows that MNREGA getting better by the second year. The
wages were increased considerably and also the work was provided for more
number of days. In the second year a family or a household is shown earning
about Rs. 3000 – a neat sum which can square all the pending needs. With more
number of working days leading to more sum of money, there is likely a chance
for increase in demand for employment. The local panchayat (LP) answered in
the affirmative, but even then it had some difficulty in allocating works for the
next financial year.
Table 28 - Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Madhupur
lxix
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
. Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per
from provided days by day by the hhd
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds (Rs.)
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
MADHU
PUR 2008 10 15 14 210 60 12,600 1,260
1. -
2009
2.
10 10 07 70 70 4,900 490
2009
-
2010
In Madhupur, as the table 28 shows that MNREGA is not very effective. It did
not bring any huge amount of income to the households. The second year of its
implementation is worst for it provided income that is under Rs.500 on an
average to the households. With such low earnings, it’s obvious that people lost
interest. Moreover, the payments were also delayed as one had to transact from
the banks or post offices.
lxx
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
1.
2008 10 18 10 180 62 11,160 1,160.0
DHANG -
DHINGURI 2009
2.
2009 10 12 14 168 68 11,424 1,114.4
-
2010
Table 30- Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Patlakhawa
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per
from provided days by day by the hhd
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds (Rs.)
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
The above table 30 reflects Patlakhawa GP in poor light. Not only the number
of days under wage employment was very low, but in the second year – the
lxxi
wage paid per day declined to a considerable level. In both years of its
implementation, the interviewed households were not able to get even a sum of
Rs. 500. That too, in the second year delays in payments made the effectiveness
of MNREGA in addressing its core issues debatable.
Table 31- Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Deoanhat
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
As the table 31 shows the performance of Deoanhat is fair and good in the first
case. But then the scheme turned to be mere eyewash to the households that
were interviewed. There was erosion in not only allocating works to the number
of people but also in the number of working days. Moreover, in this GP the sum
offered as wages was too low, not even touching the figure of Rs.60.
Table 32- Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in
Ghughumari
lxxii
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
Table 32 shows that Ghughumari was not able to allocate a decent number of
working days, as the work-days were fewer than 10 days every year of its run.
Even, when the wages were raised over-all in the Gram Panchayats in the
second year of MNREGA getting implemented, there was no rise in wages to
the households that were interviewed for the study.
Table 33- Number of working days and wages earned by the hhds in Sukthabari
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
1.
SUKTHA 2008 10 19 10 190 65 12,350 1,235.00
BARI -
2009
2. 10 23 07 161 70 11,120 1,120.00
2009
-
2010
In Sukthabari, table 33, the numbers of work-days provided were very less,
barely touching the double-digit figure. But, the person-days generated were
better than most of the Gram Panchayats as many members of the hhds were
given jobs, though not for a longer period.
lxxiii
Table 34- Number of working days and the wages earned by the hhds in
Panishala
S.No Local Year No. Total no. No. of Total no. Wage Total Wages
Panchayat of of benefi working of given wages earned
(LP) hhds -ciaries days working per earned per hhd
from provided days by day by the (Rs.)
all the the hhds (Rs.) hhds
hhds (Rs.)
1 2 3 4 5 = 3X4 6 7=5X6 8
2.
2008 10 10 12 120 60 7,200 720.00
-
2009
lxxiv
# Average wage-payment of a household in the sample 2,014.00
6.1 Pattern of utilization of wage-payments: MNREGS is
basically a demand driven programme. Actual provision of employment is based
on demand expressed by the registered persons at the Gram Panchayat. Based on
demand from at least ten persons, a new work is to be started for providing
employment.
Although the average days of employment calculated over the entire district is
not high, however in areas with high demand for work, wage employment could
have been provided for substantial numbers of days, provided, the schemes
executed not only generate employment for the villagers in the implementing
year but should also make a provision for generation of employment at a greater
scale on a sustained basis. The schemes that are executed under MNREGA apart
from provided wages for decent standard of living during off-season times
should also strengthen the agrarian economy of the locality.
Low or high, the earned wages constituted fairly a larger share in the months of
demand. So it was proposed to study what was done by the households with the
wage-payments obtained. As in many cases, wages were not paid on a daily
basis, but were given in bulk amounts at the end of their work period, whether
the work-period was for seven days or seventeen days. So, the wages obtained in
bulk must have been used for some special purpose- which must have been
decided earlier, of what to buy on obtaining such a wage amount. It is to be
understood that their day-day living wants should have been covered with the
money they obtain by their usual sort of ways, that they are used with before the
implementation of MNREGA. The households should have even procured debts
from their neighbours by counting on their wage payments. And in this way the
wage-payments from MNREGA was also seen in the light of debt-clearance.
Plus, as even the labour households which were interviewed had some bigha of
land in their possession, the MNREGA wage payments could have also been
used in their agricultural activities. Since, one of the purposes of this study was
to determine how far the MNREGA implementation has had impacted
agricultural activities in the locality, questions were also raised on how much the
households utilized their payment especially for agricultural and agricultural
related activities.
The below Table 36 indicates the number of contact-members who agreed to the
priority given and had spent some amount of money obtained through
MNREGA wage payments on such agreed priority. Thus the table 36 shows,
given ten households in a particular Gram Panchayat were taken in to study of
how the wage amount obtained was used then these are all the parameters that
could be taken in to account.
lxxv
Nevertheless, the table shows the intensity of the wages obtained being used
over a particular option. It can be seen that all the households in every Gram
Panchayat cited agriculture in their usage of wage payments. So a considerable
sum of money should have been used in this option either directly or indirectly.
* 2–4
@ 5–7
& 7 - 10
lxxvi
All the households that were interviewed as the table 36 asseverates also agreed
to have spent on social ceremonies. By social ceremony, all the family
obligations like arranging a special feast for the newly married or buying
presents for any function or staging of any family ceremony or donations that
were forwarded to anything specifying religious interest were all included. Even
if the priorities were met only when the wage payments obtained were to be
utilized along with money obtained from various other sources of day-day living
of the households, then also the responses were taken into account.
Agricultural needs and ceremonial needs may be mentioned as special cases. But
food and clothing form the basic options. Needless to say, as the table 36 shows,
all the households utilized the money for these two options. But the households
in Patlakhawa and Panishala gave the responses in the negative, when asked
about the wage amount spent on clothes. It can be understood, that since the
households of these two Gram Panchayats reported very low earnings under
MNREGA, and so the programme had no special impact on them. And the small
amounts of wage-payments obtained by these households were much like
ordinary day-to-day wages that they receive on doing their usual works for
livelihood.
Very few households spent on medical needs. Well, that can be understood as
special and specific need but a fewer households spending on entertainment, that
too reported in only one Gram Panchayat-Pundibari and no households spent
particularly on education- it just means that these are not on their priorities’ list.
But, in any case- they also reflect their lack of interest. Once again, Engel’s
Theory gets vindicated. With lesser the wage received, the pattern of spending is
restricted to only a few priorities, food forming the major one and larger the
wage received the spending pattern was seen diversified with larger amounts
getting used on status related priorities, like social ceremonies and lesser amount
on basic necessities like food.
1. PUNDIBARI @ & * @ *
lxxvii
3. DANGDINGGURI * & * & *
4. PATLAKHAWA * @ * @
6. GHUGHUMARI * @ * *
7. SUKTAHBARI @ & *
8. PANISHALA * * @
* 2–4
@ 5–7
& 7 - 10
As almost all the households holding land- however small it may be- reported
spending on agricultural activities, it would be of special interest of how
diversified their spending was on agriculture. With much diversification
happening on spending over agricultural needs (table 37), it can be guessed up
to what level agriculture gets the priority over all the options mentioned.
Moreover a household’s monthly requirement for agricultural activities gets
determined and with money at hand, how far a household goes in making the
agricultural activities get wider could be seen.
In case of seeds, very few households reported spending on seeds, that too only
in the case of the purchase of the seeds for Chilly crop (as in Deoanhat and
Sukthabari) and for purchase of seeds of Tomato in Panishala. These seeds
purchased are all hybrid seeds, and for paddy which is the main crop, a certain
quantity of the harvest was put forth in the previous season itself for the purpose
use it as seeds. The households which reported the purchase of seeds were,
actually, land owners by class. And in the case of agricultural labour households
having lands not much was cared about seed-purchase.
The same was true for the MNREGA’ wage amount getting utilized for
agricultural facilities (table 37) as none of the households of the Gram
Panchayats under study utilized or were able to utilize the wage-payments for
facilitating agriculture. By agricultural facilities it was meant all those that
would lead to improvisation in their farming practices than what was being done
lxxviii
like establishing drip irrigation or constructing bore wells or buying pumps or
fencing their fields.
But almost all of the households agreed in principle that a certain part of their
wage amount was put in to the purchase of agricultural inputs.
Another interesting case being, all the households- whether land owners or
agricultural labourers had some debts ranging from a few hundreds to small
thousands. And the response, for putting the wage amount via MNREGA to
clear wages at least to some extent was overwhelming. It can be understood that
borrowing credits is a life-issue, more specially with agricultural labourers and
clearing it anyway forms the major priority for many.
lxxix
4. PATLAKHAWA
5. DEOANHAT *
6. GHUGHUMARI
7. SUKTAHBARI *
8. PANISHALA *
* 2–4
@ 5–7
& 7 - 10
The Gram Panchayats which obtained very low or less wage-payments like
Patlakhawa (Rs. 455 & Rs. 432 on an average) or Panishala (Rs. 550 & Rs. 720
on an average) (see tables 30 & 34) didn’t make any purchase. The wage-
amount obtained, more likely should have been consumed in the day-day
activity itself. On the other hand, Gram Panchayats with fairly good earnings
like Pundibari (Rs. 1,729 & 2,980 on an average), see table 28, reported on the
purchase of many assets of various uses like purchase of mobile phone, livestock
and agricultural implements in the Pundibari GP.
This study advocates the point that more the wages getting earned, then more
improved would be the spending pattern of the people. But overall, the
performance of the Gram Panchayats in implementing the scheme is lack-lustre
and the people didn’t bother to demand as our findings reveal (see table 35).
And even if the demands were made the recalcitrant Gram Panchayats didn’t
burden themselves to create works (see table 11 and figure 8). But, certainly
the people are interested to do any work that the Gram Panchayat allocates, as
our survey reveals. This shows that the people want the Gram Panchayats to take
full control of all the responsibilities that the scheme bestows on them. In short,
to the people interviewed MNREGA programme was just like any other
governmental poverty alleviation programmes that were in effect so far. It did
not cut any ice.
lxxx
interesting to know the initial responses of the villagers about their perceived
impact of MNREGA on certain socio-economic features in the villages. The
respondents of the sample were asked about their perceptions about the
following features:
lxxxii
6.3 Impact on migration: Migration of labor from one area to another
within a country or across the globe is always a welcome feature of a free world,
as long as it is not distress migration, i.e., migration under compulsion. Unless
such distress migration is operationally distinguished from induced migration to
take advantage of better economic opportunities in a new region, one would tend
to overplay the disadvantages of migration. So, the aim of MNREGA should not
be or should never be stoppage of all kinds of migration, but only distress
migration (Vijay Shankar, 2008).
The people are mostly agriculturalists. When there is no work in the field men
may be found willing to serve for wages [Chaudhury 1901]. This is the case with
the agricultural labourers of Cooch Behar and hence, if works under MNREGA
get provided throughout the off-season, no doubt, they will be benefited.
The table 40 shows that until 1961 the percentage of agricultural labourer to the
total workers was below 10. The percentage decreased from 1951 to 1961,
which might be due to implementation of land reforms legislation and surplus
lands might have been distributed among landless people. There was however, a
gradual increase in the number of agricultural labourers from 1961 to 1981. The
point to be noted is that the percentage of increase is comparatively higher in the
case of female labourers than male. Migration might be responsible for such an
increase.
lxxxiii
GRAM PANCHAYAT of migration
1. PUNDIBARI
C, M , H
2. MADHUPUR C, M, S, H
3. DANGDINGGURI C
4. PATLAKHAWA
C, ML
5. DEOANHAT C, H, S
6. GHUGHUMARI C, H
7. SUKTAHBARI C
8. PANISHALA C
Income
Income
Activity done in the per Activity done in the
per
Index place of month Index place of
month
migration (Rs.) migration
(Rs.)
2000- 1500-
H HOTELS
C CONSTRUCTION 3000 2500
4000- 1500 –
M MANUFACTURING S SHOPS
6000 2000
2000-
ML MALLS
2500
lxxxiv
When we compare the average amount wage payments received by the
households under study (see table 35) with table 42 which gives out the amount
received on migration, then we can effectively hit the hammer upon the idea of
MNREGA and can lend a thought that MNREGA wage payments so far have
been never be a good substitute for the people who migrate and find some work
which could pay them regularly.
lxxxv
Accountability YES
Empowerment NO
lxxxvi
But this low level of women participation is not a pan-India phenomenon. There
are some large states where the participation of women is found to be much
higher than the desired level of at least one-third participation. For example,
there are some states where the participation of women (over all the years of
MNREGA implementation) has found to be more than satisfactory. A good list
to showcase our observation has been given below:
S.No. State % of women
participation
1. Tamil Nadu 83 %
2. Andhra Pradesh 59 %
3. Orissa 58 %
4. Rajasthan 43 %
5. Gujarat 43 %
6. Madhya Pradesh 41 %
Source: www.nrega.nic.in & Dreze (2010)
SUMMARY
&
CONCLUSION
lxxxvii
7.0 CONCLUSION:
MNREGA ranks among the most powerful initiatives ever undertaken for
transformation of rural livelihoods in India. The unprecedented commitment of
financial resources is matched only by its imaginative architecture that promises
a radically fresh programme of rural development. May be
The initiatives that the scheme has got within were never seen in any poverty
alleviation schemes that were run before. The innovations like Social Audits
(SA), gives the right to the people to air their views and concerns in proper
platforms set by the community itself on specific intervals, thereby aiming to
address all the loopholes and make the scheme to become more progressive. The
scheme is also woven with transparency, if one would like to believe only the
guidelines upon which the scheme has been framed. Making every information
of every work of every village in every operation to get available in public
domain, MNREGA makes the mandatory use of technology and sees that every
progress happening all over the country strictly gets recorded with Management
and Information System (MIS), thereby becoming available for public scrutiny.
But all is not well with MNREGA, as the Table 44 suggests that it suffers the
same fate of any other Wage Employment Programme (WEP): lack of funds.
lxxxviii
Year Rural Urban Total Employment
Employm Employment Generation Programmes
ent (Swarna Jayanti
Sahari Rojgar
Yojana)
1998-99 0.21 0.01 0.22
1999-00 0.19 0.01 0.20
2000-01 0.13 0.00 0.14
2001-02 0.20 0.00 0.20
2002-03 0.40 0.00 0.40
2003-04 0.37 0.00 0.37
2004-05 0.23 0.00 0.23
2005-06 0.33 0.00 0.34
2006-07 0.33 0.01 0.34
2007-08 0.55 0.01 0.56
2008-09 0.51 0.00 0.51
lxxxix
Fig.10 THE PERFORMANCE OF MNREGA SO FAR
IN THE ‘INDIAN SUB-CONTINENT’:
In this figure 10, every radius of the circle stands for the relative performances
of the States in creating the number of person-days: the main motto of the
scheme. By figure 13 we could see that only a few states have been witnessed
with the kind of performance that is desired with a substantial show in number
of person-days created. And in the state of West Bengal the radius of the circle
is as small as it could be but should not be. “When something is small then there
should be some other thing which makes that something small” (Dostoyevsky).
xc
three financial years of programme implementation. The details given in Table
45, illustrates the message for certain.
2006- 43 09 44 03 - -
2007
2007- 62 15 68 06 32 0.00
2008
2008- 72 23 59 01 18 0.03
2009
2009- 61 12 67 02 06 0.01
2010
Source : Data obtained from MNREGA Cell OF Cooch Behar and from
www.nrega,nic,in
As the table 45 shows, the States were left with no means to implement the
scheme in such away so as to provide employment for all registered rural
households to complete one hundred days of wage employment. In fact, it can be
seen that even the allocation of jobs to all demanding households was not made
possible and not to speak about 100 days of work.
But our findings in the district of Cooch Behar revels that the nature of
employment is seasonal and that the duration of employment sought varies
according to the prevailing opportunities of employment offered in local
agricultural practices and other alternative forms of employment and all job-card
holders do not necessarily sought or need for the full one hundred days of
employment.
But all that the scheme could show was a dismal performance. Apart from our
findings from the study, this is also vindicated by the reports of the MNREGA
implementation presented in the State Legislative Assembly, by the West Bengal
government as required by the scheme’s guideline: Section 7 (3a).
xci
The reports submitted by the government rated the performance of MNEGA in
all the districts and ranked them accordingly, based on a few parameters as
chosen by the government. Those rankings and the parameters on which those
rankings were based are given in the following Table 46.
Moreover our study revealed that MNREGA in the district suffers from the
following shortcomings:
Utilization of funds is lower (see table 35)
The number of person-days of wage employment provided per family is
also very low, inadequate to help the beneficiaries to derive a sustainable
livelihood and become non-poor (see table 8, 9 and figure 4).
Minimum wages are not paid due to high productivity norms (see table
23).
There are also huge delays in wage payment (see table 19).
The worksites are devoid of any facilities.
xcii
Village level monitoring and vigilance committees are usually not
constituted in most places, which results in very little accountability and
transparency (see table 18).
No attention has been given to capacity building of the PRI functionaries
and workers at the village level.
There is a top-down bureaucratic approach and centralized character of
implementation and planning
Women’s participation in planning and works has been low and their
tasks at worksites are invisible, unpaid and subsumed under the overall
labour process (see table 43).
It has had become a supply-driven programme.
Even it is agreeable that the nature of employment is seasonal and that the
duration of employment sought varies according to the prevailing opportunities
of employment offered in local agricultural practices and other alternative forms
of employment and all job-card holders do not necessarily sought or need for the
full one hundred days of employment (see table 14).
Some of the suggestions that may help in stemming all the rot that the findings
show are given below. These suggestions have been offered after close perusal
of the findings of the study.
xciii
1. Quality of planning is a vital chug in the implementation of MNREGA in
entirety. The demand for work can be met with proper work-openings
only if shelf of projects is kept ready in each village by the Gram
panchayats with technical and administrative approvals.
ii) work selection and execution data including, shelf of approved and
sanctioned works,
xciv
leads to higher rural incomes, which in turn spur private investment, and
greater incomes and employment.
xcv
The cost of each work taken at a time to be less than three lakh rupees so
as to implement the works effectively with strict monitoring.
To have the number of works at the site reported to the block office
through
12. MNREGA funds have to be allocated for the provision of safe drinking
water, shade for periods of rest, first aid and child care facilities at the
worksites in the district of Cooch Behar. The last of these, in particular,
is significant in order to make MNREGA work a viable option for
women with young children who cannot be left alone at home.
SCOPE
AND
xcvi
HOPE
xcvii
May be nothing is wrong with the very idea of MNREGA, as the Act and the
Guidelines actually provide a fairly clear and comprehensive roadmap for
putting in place effective transparency safeguards, and the main issue is to
ensure that these safeguards are strictly enforced and adhered to (Reetika
Khera,2008).
xcviii
• Thought wise MNREGA may be a quantum jump in promoting public
participation, but we need to create links between the scheme and other
developmental activities including public health, safe drinking water,
literary programmes and promotion of skilled labour (Swaminathan,
2009).
• The state government can involve other departments like public works,
irrigation, forests in a bid to expedite the process (Biman Bose, 2008).
This suggestion can be given a thought as it would result in not only
expediting the process but also lead to the creation of more number of
days and along with useful creation of assets apart from ensuring more
number of developmental works getting carried out.
• Moreover the above given suggestion can also be extended to include all
the developmental works that a Gram Panchayat has to carry out in a
financial year. Literally, MNREGA should get to become into such a
scheme that should comprise of all the employable developmental
activities that come under the purview of every Gram Panchayat (Rao,
2009). This would lead to more planning and thereby less arbitrary
nature of works getting selected for implementation.
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EPILOGUE:
The World Bank has described the much acclaimed MNREGA as a policy
barrier hurting economic development which discourages migration as lifting
people out of poverty which requires shifting people from demand surplus areas
to demand deficit areas, including cities in all walks of livelihood options
(Halan, 2008).
In its ‘World Development Report, 2009’ the world monetary authority argues
that the schemes like MNREGA act as ‘policy barriers to internal mobility’
(Murugavel, 2008).
The report further concludes that “lifting people out of poverty requires shifting
population from villages (of surplus labour) to demand areas, including cities”.
The report proceeds listing out the benefits from ‘population mobility’. And
takes a dig at the policy making bodies of India which come up with such
schemes like MNREGA, as this reflects the non- recognition of the benefits of
migration on one hand and disallowing communities to fully capture the benefits
of labour mobility on the other.
No doubt, MNREGA ranks among the most powerful initiatives ever undertaken
for transformation of rural livelihoods in India. The unprecedented commitment
of financial resources is matched only by its imaginative architecture that
promises a radically fresh programme of rural development.
c
ANNEXURES
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
8. ‘World Development Report’ of the world Bank, 2009, pp: 75, 82,161 &
243-292
cii
10. India Today, transforming from a workable economy in to a global force
– Competition success Review, May 2010 – Pg. no. 16.
15. Seventh Report of the Rural labour Enquiry ( Labour Bureau, 2004)
16. Priya, Lakshmi & Halan, Ganga: Economic and Political Weekly,
‘Agrarian Changes and Attached Labour’, Vol XXIX, No 39, September
24, 2007. pp: 1227-1238.
18. Lalit Mathur: Fulfilling the promise, Yojana, September 2007, pp: 28-33
19. Singh, Raghuvansh Prasad: Two years of NREGA, Yojana, April 2008,
pp: 32-33.
20. Gopi Nath Ghosh: Social Audit and MNREGA, Kurukshetra, February
2008,
pp: 54
22. Reetika Khera : The Black Hole of NREGA Records, The Times of India,
February 16, 2009.
24. Mihir Shah, P S Vijay Shankar: MNREGA: The road ahead, The New
Indian Express, June 16, 2008
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25. S K Rao: Need For Introspection, Yojana, August,2007, pp: 28-32.
28. Devjyot Ghoshal: SMS to boost MNREGA projects, The Times of India,
June 6, 2009.
31. Sinha, VS: ‘The malaises pounding on NREGA’, The Telegraph, May
17, 2009.
32. Priya, Chatterjee: Boost to NREGS projects ‘The Times of India’ June,1,
2009.
33. Rahul, Sanghvi: NREGA: Hope and Despair, The Statesman, March 15,
2009
34. The Hindu, June 22 – 25, 2008 : Interview with Jean Dreze.
35. Dreze, Jean: Act fair , give rural workers their due,The times of India,
April 4,2008
36. Debraj Bhattacharya: ‘The 100 –day wonder’ The Statesman, February
16,2010
37. Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey: ‘ MNREGA: Breeding new grounds,
The Hindu, February, 16, 2010.
39. Lakshmi Priya Halan: Card Carrying but jobless in Bengal: The Times
Of India
Feb 21, 2008
40. Sharma, Aananth: Suicide Belt on debt row, The New Indian Express,
Feb 16, 2009
civ
41. Shyam Saran: Pucca work, kaccha payment, The Times of India, July 12
2009
44. Sastry, Shyama: NREGA: yet to get intensified in rural Bengal, The
Hindu, July 3, 2008
45. http://www.indiadevelopmentblog.com/2009/06/nrega-analysis-of-
payment-method.html
- accessed on February 16,2009
51. http://business.rediff.com/column/2010/mar/29/column-why-nrega-is-a-
dud.htm
52. http://www.nrega.net/pin/pin-members-and-coverage/
SCHEDULES
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Name: Address:
Educational Status:
S.No Family Education
Member Status
iii) Yield:
iv) Price Obtained:
v) Appx. monthly earnings:
before
Wealth MNREGA
possession:
after
MNREGA
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SCHEDULE 2 : Extent of participation of a rural household in MNREGA
Name : Age:
Amount paid:
S.No. MNREGA Wages received
beneficiaries of the hhd (in Rs.)
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Type of work done:
S.No. MNREGA Type of work done
beneficiaries of the hhd
i) Newspapers
ii) Television/ Radio:
iii) Local Panchayat ( LP) :
iv) Word-of-mouth :
Where the MNREGA account has been opened: Bank / Post Office.
Any account previously held, whether in banks or Post Office : Yes / No.
How much one gets as payment :
Any knowledge about social Audit : Yes / No.
Does the Job-Card is kept in self-possession? Yes / No.
Any knowledge about unemployment allowance : Yes / No.
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SCHEDULE 4 : Estimation of disposable income that a household
gets through MNREGA.
Previous Occupation:
Place of migration :
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Type of work done in the place of migration :
Income earned:
Is the income earned more than what could be earned through MNREGA at its
full capacity ?
Yes / No
< 20
20- 35
35-45
45-60
< 60
ii) Amount of migration :
< 20
20- 35
35-45
45-60
< 60
iii) Amount of returnees to the village due to MNREGA :
O significant O negligible O trace O not-at-all
SCHEDULE : 6 – MNREGA and women empowerment
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Allotment of work to women:
i) same as men -
ii) same as men, but less physical -
iii) totally different from men -
O Household
O Health
O Agricultural activity
O Education
O Social Ceremony
Distance of worksite from dwelling, in the previous time:
O less than 5 km
O 5-10 km
O 10-15 km
O > 15 km.
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#) If irrigated, specify the type of irrigation :
i) Well
ii) Tube-Well
iii) Canal
iv) Drip
Cropping Intensity :
Secondary Occupation :
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s.no from farm from allied to from non farm TOTAL
activities farm activities activities
Do you think that MNREGA works can be done side-by-side along with farm
works during a normal season ? Yes / No.
Did you have account in the banks/ post offices already before MNREGA ? Yes/
No
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SCHEDULE: 08 – Seasonal pattern for agricultural activities and the impact of
MNREGA ( for agricultural labourers).
Crops in cultivation :
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S.No Month/s of Lean period of Period of no or
hectic farm farm work nil farm work
work
Participation in MNREGA :
Did MNREGA participation lead to the increase in farm wages: Yes / No.
Before MNREGA, what was used to be done during lean season or offseason:
1.
2.
3.
Were you a migrant, once or before ? Yes / No.
What was mainly done with the wages obtained from MNREGA ?
1.
2.
3.
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2–5
5–7
7- 10
> 10
O Institutional
O Non- Institutional
Was the wage amount earned from MNREGA used to part with the
indebtedness, at least to some extent ? Yes / No.
Number of times participated in the Gram Sabha Meetings in the last season :
Did you ever participae in those meeting to air your concerns about MNREGA :
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SCHEDULE: 09 – Performance of the Local Panchayat ( LP )
Name of the LP :
1.
2.
3.
4.
Implementation of MNREGA :
O 2007 – 2008
O 2008 – 2009
O 2009 - 2010
s.no.
year of no. of working total no. no. of no. of no. of hhds total
implement days provided of hhds hhds jobcards provided man-da
tation under provided work generat
MNREGA
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How the work-sites were chosen ?
Number of times the VCMs were held in the LP for the last season :
How do you rate the type of demand from people for MNREGA ?
O High
O Satisfactory
O Low
O Poor
O Trace
O Insignificant
Completion of works ;
1.
2.
3.
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Profile of the beneficiaries :
S.No. % of % of % of SC % of ST
beneficiaries women partici partici
from the total participation pation pation
hhds
Utilization of funds:
Fund Utilized
Any innovative solution or technique or way of approach that suited the local
needs, discovered so far and forwarded to the next level of hierarchy in the
administration;
What, in your opinion and experience, needs to be done to expedite the process
of implementing MNREGA?
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