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Journalism of Courage
The Centre Sunday announced to pump additional Rs 40,000 crore for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) for FY21.
Announcing a hike in the MGNREGA allocation as part of the government’s Rs 20 lakh crore COVID-19 relief package, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said additional funds will help “generate nearly 300 crore person days” during the current financial year.
The announcement comes at a time when the demand for unskilled work under MGNREGA had increased to a record level in recent years, showing a slowdown in the economy.
Data available on MGNREGA portal shows, during 2019-20, 5.48 crore households worked under the rural job guarantee scheme, which is the highest since 2010-11 when it was 5.5 crore. In the last financial year, the number of individuals who worked under MGNREGA had soared up to 7.89 crore which is the highest since 2012-13 when the number was 7.97 crore.
A record number of 9.33 crore persons demanded work under MGNREGA in last financial year, against that 9.30 crore individuals were offered jobs and 7.89 crore individuals worked.
In the last financial year, 265.36 crore personday were generated against a target of 276.76 crore. During the current financial year, 27 crore person days have been offered in 2 weeks of May, compared to 2 weeks during the corresponding month of last year. About 16 crore person days have been generated so far this financial year.
