THE National Rural Employment Gurantee Act (NREGA) promises to provide at least 100 days of guaranteed employment to every household in one fiscal year. Implicit in the scheme is building rural infrastructure and making a reality the concept of ‘Decentralized Planning’. In consonance with the NREGA, the Orissa Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme was formulated. But the present status of implementation of this scheme in the areas of Kalahandi, Ganjam and Gajapati, Kandhamala, Koraput districts depicts a very apathetic picture. Though NREG Act is a well thought-out legislation, a powerful tool in the hands of the common people to get their basic livelihood, but its poor execution, deprives them of their basic rights.

 

Provisions for safeguard of transparency and accountability are incorporated into the Act and also in the NREGA guidelines. For instance the NREGA guidelines require muster rolls to be available in the Panchayat office and also at work sites. This can go a long way to preventing corruption in wage payments, since it makes the muster rolls available for public scrutiny and social audit. But the reality is somewhat else.

 

Surveys conducted by a group of NGOs in Bamunigaon and Tumdibandha blocks of Kandhamala districts and Semiliguda and Dasamantpur blocks of Koraput district, Jagannathprasad blocks of the Ganjam district makes the following observations:

 

• All families have not been registered
• Many families have not received their job cards
• In some instances, where Job Cards have been issued to the people, work days were already written in the cards at the time of their issuance
• In some cards the number of workdays mentioned is more that the days people have worked
• Names of dead people are there in the job cards
• Contractors are doing the work in most of the cases
• Meetings are held only at the Gram Panchayat level, no meetings to plan for the works at Pallisabha or Gram Sabha

 

Many instances can be illustrated about the mismanagement of the NREGA act.

 

Case Study:

 

The villagers of Gayaganda, Rudhapadar and Khetramundali gram panchayat worked under NREGS for around 10 to 15 days. As per the rules, the labourers are entitled to get their wages within 15 days of completion of work and the people of the same villages also submitted their application at the Panchayat office to do unskilled manual work. Considering this, the government had to provide employment opportunity after receiving the application but work was not provided. Hence they decided to take the initiative for putting an application regarding unemployment allowance. When there was no response from either the block office or Panchayat office, steps were taken to contact the higher authority. Mr Kailash Das, of Talaganda village under Gayaganda panchayat of Jagannathprasad block applied for a job under OREGS on 14th July 2006 to the executive officer of Gayaganda panchayat but he did not receive any information after fifteen days of sending an application as per NREGA rules. Subsequently he applied to the BDO, the collector, the labour minister and the grievance cell of the chief minister but to no avail.

        

RTI and NREGA:

 

In view of these kinds of observations, it has become necessary to invoke various provisions of the Act made to maintain transparency and accountability in the work and for effective implementation of the scheme. The Right to Information (RTI) Act, being a powerful tool for seeking accountability from the government authorities, should be made use of towards this end. The NREGA in fact provides that in case of any grievance, a person can file a complaint with the programme officer (BDO in case of Orissa), then with the District Programme Coordinator (Collector) and finally with the State Project Coordinator. People should use these provisions for their benefits.

 

Social Audit and NREAGA:

 

Social audit is a technique of ensuring accountability of public servants to the public in public matters. In keeping with the spirit of RTI, section 17 of NREGA clearly dictates the Gram Panchayat to make available all relevant documents of the works done with the Gram Sabha for social audit. The OREGS under section31. 1 also visualizes a Vigilance and Monitoring Committee in every village constituting the beneficiaries of the scheme to monitor the progress of work. Under section 4(b) of RTI Act, an individual citizen can inspect the public documents held by any public authorities and can take extracts and photocopies paying requisite fees.

 

Even after all necessary care been taken in the Act, rules, notifications etc, it cannot be more unfortunate if it still fails in the State during execution. The primary role for making the Act a success depends more on civil society organizations who can guide the masses better than the government. Civil society bodies should keep a vigilant eye always on the implementation of the Act.