Double Trouble for MGNREGA In Odisha as Center Reduces Allocation; Previous Outstandings Still Not Cleared By Center

Bhubaneswar: Finance Minister Nirmala Sithraman has presented the Union Budget in the Parliament and her speech of more than one and half hours had included various facets of the Indian economy except the most important component of rural employment i.e., Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. At a time when the country is going through the difficult times of Pandemic that had an deep impact on the livelihoods of millions of people, the Government has just forgot or deliberately left it to the back. The MGNREGA had came as an efficient tool in the hands of the government in the last two years when millions of people got employment and the rural economy got a boost that was otherwise facing the difficulties of COvid-19.

The Budget for 2022-23 has not mentioned any increase in the allocation for this Employment Generation Act but literally reduces the allocation by about 25 percent. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has allocated an amount of Rs 73 thousand Crore in the Budget for the grassroots rural employment scheme MGNREGA, which is 25 percent lower than the Rs 98,000 crore revised estimates for the scheme in the current year. The Act had seen the highest ever allocation of Rs 1.11 Lakh crore in 2020 due to the Pandemic when more than 11 crore people were provided employment bringing much respite to the pandemic stricken workforce. But In 2021, the Budget was slashed to Rs 73 thousand crore thereby making it difficult for the states to even clear all the dues of the workers. The Center is yet to make payment of bills amounting to more than Rs 12 thousand crores to the states for the last year. This will have an impact on the coming financial year as the bills will further reduce the available amount for payment.

The Rs 73 thousand Crore allocation this year to MGNREGA will make it difficult for the state governments to continue the livelihoods program and also clearing the pending due of the workers. States like Odisha, which are demanding higher personyears under the scheme, will see this as a bottleneck in rural development. The Odisha Government has been demanding the release of the pending MGNREGA funds amounting to about one thousand Crore. The funds crunch has been affecting payments to the rural workers who are in some areas are waiting for more than three months to receive their dues. The Center’s unimportance to the rural employment scheme is going to hit the rural economy and this year there are many chances that the number of people getting livelihoods from it reducing significantly.

The Odisha Government is said to have used its own resources amounting to Rs 752 Crore to clear the dues of the workers to keep up the Act going on. The Odisha government has given utmost priority to the rural works during the Pandemic as millions of people came back to the state from outside. It also saw addition of good infrastructure in the rural areas of the state in the last two years in terms of roads and other facilities. The state had planned to more augment the MNREGA in the state in the coming days by increasing persondays and number of workers engaged. But the Budget has made it clear that the state has to wait.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, in his post budget reactions, has said that the reduction in the MGNREGA budget will hurt the livelihoods of rural workers. In November last year, the Chief Minister had written a letter to the Prime Minister requesting to release the pending dues and enhance the labour budget of Odisha under scheme to 25 crore person days. The CM had written, “Timely payment of wages to poor jobseekers is the fundamental guarantee under the MGNREG Act. Similarly, timely release of payment for material is critical for creation of tangible and durable assets under the MGNREGS,”.

The nonpayment of dues for more than three months to the rural workers will have an impact on their participation in the coming days. About 5638 Panchayats out of the 6801 Panchayats in Odisha are implementing the MGNREGA. Official reports say that there has been a delay in the payment of more than 47 thousand bills in the state.