MGNREGA: Violating own rules, Govt yet to clear wages for works executed in 3 years

Rs 136.71 cr liabilities for wages, material payments not clear since 2021; 2.94 lakh jobs deleted in 5 yrs

Jammu: In clear violation of the Centre’s ambitious rural job plan guidelines, wages of MGNREGA workers and payments to contractors for materials used in development works, executed across Jammu and Kashmir during the last three years (March 2021 to July 2024), have remained unpaid till date.
According to the official documents tabled in Parliament, the government is yet to clear the pending liabilities worth Rs 4.07 crore on account of wages of MGNREGA workers, who executed various development works for the period from March 2021 to July 2024. Similarly, the pending liabilities worth Rs 132.64 crore for material components under the scheme for the period have also not been released to date.
As per the guidelines of the scheme, wages of MGNREGA workers should be paid within a week, or 15 days at most through direct bank transfers. And if there is a delay in payment beyond the 16th day of muster roll closure, wage seekers are entitled to compensation at a rate of 0.05% of the unpaid wages per day of delay.
As a face-saver exercise, the government, however, claimed that the States and UTs submit funds release proposals to the Government of India under Mahatma Gandhi NREGS. The Ministry releases funds periodically in two tranches with each tranche consisting of one or more installments, keeping in view the “agreed to” Labour Budget, demand for works, opening balance, pace of utilization of funds, pending liabilities, overall performance and subject to submission of relevant documents by the States/UTs”.
It further said, “Fund release to the States/UTs is a continuous process and the Central Government is committed to making funds available to States/UTs for the implementation of the Scheme as per the demand for work on the ground”.
The statistic revealed that a total of 2, 94,390 jobs cards were deleted under the MGNREGA for the period 2019-20 to July 2024 after verification of these cards. No specific reason was given for deletion of job cards.
“Job cards can be cancelled/deleted, after due verification only if it is a fake job card (incorrect job card), duplicate job card, households not willing to work, family shifted from Gram Panchayat permanently and single person in job card and that person has expired,” an official document said while stating that over 2.90 job cards were deleted for the period.
The statistics also showed that the Centre has released an amount of Rs 3,384.76 crore to Jammu and Kashmir under MGNREGA from 2021-22 to 2024-25 (till July 25 this year) while the Union Territory made an expenditure of Rs 3,574 crore to carry out development activities and payment of wages under the scheme for the period.
“As many as 77,512 households completed the 100 days of employment under the MGNREGA in Jammu and Kashmir during the last five years.
Under Social Audit Recovery, a total of 2442 cases came under scanner and a final recoverable amount of Rs 91.64 lakh was made after the audit.
The Centre has empanelled independent agencies as National Level Monitors (NLMs) with the Ministry of Rural Development to conduct special monitoring visit to monitor the progress of the implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in States and UTs. The NLM These agencies are required to visit the selected districts to observe and monitor the progress made under the scheme and assess the quality of implementation therein.

Updated On 8/3/2024 1:05:19 AM