Whose NREGS is it anyway?

Bethumbi village in Nathwara constituency is a two-hour drive from Udaipur city, where a group of 110 workers are securing an embankment for the river Banas under the NREGS. Bhanwar Lal (56) from Bethumbi says, “We know only that the Chief Minister keeps talking about this yojna and are thankful to her for providing this scheme”. A sarpanch in Railmagra Tehsil confirms that the state government has been reaping credit for the scheme. “In most areas, the people are not too aware about the Centre and state politics, so NREGS beneficiaries believe the BJP is responsible for this as BJP workers are regularly in touch with them,” he says. “The NREGS is a very important scheme here and will obviously benefit whoever capitalises on it”.

According to the NREGS programme coordinator L L Ahir, the demand for daily wages began in 2006 in the tehsil after the region’s lifeline, Banas river, dried up. “Railmagra consists mostly of agricultural labourers, but crops have failed since the river dried up and the demand for NREGS increased,” says Ahir. Out of the 27,046 families in Railmagra Tehsil, 19,792 have been given job cards.

Unlike Gujarat and Karnataka, where in recent assembly elections the BJP has preferred to keep silent on the NREGS, the party’s Rajasthan unit has kept it in the political debate, with CM Vasundhara Raje leading the charge. In the recently held Mahakumbh for grassroots workers, Raje declared, “The implementation of NREGS in Rajasthan is the best in the country. But the Congress and UPA want to stake claim for its success by claiming it is a Centre-sponsored scheme. How dare they, when we all know that the money is collected from taxpayers like you and me?”

UPA chairperson, Sonia Gandhi, began her speech on September 8 in Deoli in Tonk district with the NREGS. She said, “The UPA is responsible for the NREGS. We designed these schemes for you and not for the Raje government to appropriate. This scheme and others have been misused in the state.”

A senior Congress leader admits that the Congress has not fully utilised the NREGS in Rajasthan. “Everything was smooth till the first list of tickets were announced after which even grassroots workers have been involved in either quelling rebellions or protesting against poor ticket distribution”.

But it is the presence of the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sanghatan that looms the largest. Ahir believes the MKSS deserves a large part of the credit for making NREGS a success in Rajasthan. “The MKSS and now several other NGOs have regularly been exposing corrupt practices in the state. This has made most officers wary and they do not attempt to take advantage of the people,” he says.

Congress, BJP — & MKSS

* The Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) began in 1987-1988 in Devdoongri village in Rajsamand district and is best known for the Right to Information campaign, which eventually culminated in the Rajasthan Right to Information Act, 2000 which came into effect in 2001. Four years later, Parliament passed the Right to Information Act in 2005. The MKSS used information as the primary tool to expose corruption in government projects in central Rajasthan where daily wage labourers were being denied wages and corruption was rampant. MKSS initially lobbied with the then Bhairon Singh Shekhawat-led BJP government to access muster rolls for employment and payment records and then held jan sunwais, where they would cross-check these records with testimonies from the labourers themselves. The jan sunwais proved incredibly successful in pinpointing corruption in the panchayat system and over time, they became the topic of debate in media and government circles.

Social audits and frequent checks of muster rolls in the state have led to the arrest of close to 123 government employees. Official records show that 42 FIRs have been registered against corrupt officials.