[Reader-list] NAREGA

[Rakesh Iyer]

Dear Bipin

Now that you have mentioned NREGA, let me state why it is actually needed.
And by the way, as per a constitutional amendment, it has now been changed
to MGREGA (Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Act).

My response:

1) The passage of NREGA or MGREGA was not a gift of Sonia Gandhi which she
had conceived on her own. Civil society organizations had been fighting and
struggling over a long period of time to introduce this act. Many people
across the country undertook struggles and all kinds of yatras to put
pressure on the govt. and get their act passed. And leading them were people
who were not involved with any political party, but belonging to civil
society and important organizations like the PUCL, the MKSS and others.

To project NREGA as an initiative of the Gandhi dynasty is to discredit all
those who fought on the road for ensuring that this act was introduced in
Parliament. It's a discredit to all those Indian citizens who are demanding
their right to livelihood and are not able to live properly as they lack
even the basic amenities of life.

2) The act obligates the Indian state to provide 100 days of employment to
any person in rural areas who has asked for it, or give an unemployment
allowance if it has not been able to provide employment to the person as
demanded. Now you are stating that this act is useless. I would say not.
Here is the reason.

Many people in rural areas are employed either as agricultural laborers, or
are seen migrating off to urban areas in search of work. Most of these
laborers are uneducated and unskilled, and hence they will not get work in
the formal or organized sector. They will get work in the unorganized
sector, which is mostly under contractors working on some project involving
construction. Or they gain employment in other areas. But most of them are
found to work for pretty low wages. This was proved by Arjun Sengupta
committee report which was constituted to deliberate upon a social security
scheme for workers in the unorganized sector. They found that 77% of the
population (2004-2005) was living on less than Rs. 20 per day, which is
ridiculous and speaks of the inequality entrenched in our society.

Most of these people were living in worse off conditions (mainly slums
without water or sanitation provisions for them). They had no social safety
nets (either education or health) to fall back upon. They had no land in the
rural areas as well which could act as an asset for them under times of
distress. They had no protection under labor laws as well since they don't
come under the organized sector. And they with little wages found it tough
to live in urban conditions with higher prices for same style of life as in
rural areas.

The biggest problems were with not only their lack of education, but also
that their children couldn't be educated since they didn't have one place of
residence. They had to move to their villages when agricultural work was
available and then go back to cities when it wasn't. The agricultural wages
paid were quite low, and since agricultural reforms haven't been undertaken
in most states (including the famous Gujarat which is worshipped by some
members in this forum, and the only exceptions being West Bengal, Kerala and
Tripura where the Left has been dominant), these people were barely able to
carry on their lives there.

A social dimension related to this is that most of these people who were
poor and working as agricultural laborers belonged to the backward castes as
also the SC's, the ST's and also the Muslims. Moreover, they had to also
face discrimination in the society, and this economic hardship put them in a
more precarious situation.

The best example to this impoverishment in rural areas can be seen in hunger
deaths in the states of India, which the state govts. deny but these
continue to take place, particularly in north India.

There was no protection possible in any form of labor they undertook to
earn, either at time of accidents or in the form of insurance.

The NREGA or MGREGA is therefore the Right to Employment. Now every person
can live in his/her rural background and get work or unemployment allowance
to earn a decent standard of living. Now they can send their children off to
school in the hope that their children can come up in life and become
stronger economically so that they won't have to depend on NREGA or MGREGA.
They will be no longe dying of the lack of food, which they can now buy as
they have money in their hands.

But the NREGA is not only ensuring that a basic human right, the right of
livelihood with dignity can be secured. It is also sound economics. How?

Simple. If the MGREGA were to be implemented well, then people can earn
money. It's not that this money will only be spent on food, though a
substantial portion will be spent on food. It will and can be spent on other
things as well. Here lies a market for those wanting to produce goods for
these people, like say small sachets of shampoos or toothbrushs and small
dant-manjans. You can sell it. And they have the capacity to buy it. The end
result is an expansion of markets.

Sending of children can help in two ways. One, it gets the society educated
and hence raises the ability of children to lead lives they can value (which
is what development should be about, not about making power plants and dams
which displace people arbitrarily just because they are poor. Why not
construct power plants at Ambani's and Tata's homes? Will they agree?)
Secondly these children can hope to get a better job tomorrow and earn more
economically, which means they can buy more goods. In other words, a huge
expansion of the market economics, and again it helps the economy as it
boosts demand and hence more goods can be produced.

You raise an important issue finally, that of corruption. Corruption is
there in all departments of the government. There are only two ways to solve
it:

i) One way is to completely dissolve all government and administration. Then
there will be no corruption, and there will be no MGREGA. But ironically we
do need the government, even the capitalists. Under capitalism, government
has to perform the role of enforcing certain rights like the Right to
Property and also ensuring the rule of law so that companies are able to
conduct their activities with full assurance of security. Otherwise they
have to be closed down.

Should we completely forsake all governance and leave it to people to govern
themselves? No. The whole country and whole world will be in chaos. That's
not what we want. We can accept anarchy (lack of order-enforcing authority)
but no govt. means sooner or later we will be in chaos. (Disorder and
violence and hungama all around).

ii) Try to bring in steps which introduce transparency in the govt. so that
corruption can be reduced. That is what we should try in our approach. But
unfortunately that is not what you hint at or look at.


So what do you want Bipin ji:

Should we decide not to ever have a government, since corruption is
inevitable wherever there is government? Is that necessary to wipe out
corruption?

Or should we try and bring about transparency measures which will remove and
root out corruption and therefore ensure that this act is actually
functioning on the ground?

Let me state that the latter should be our concern. And if you want to know
the answer why, it is very simple. On this forum, I have repeatedly used
Aashish's words (my friend and a member of this forum), and he said it
beautifully, that a democracy can only function, when those who have power
can care for those who lack power. In other words, we are educated, and we
should be concerned about those who are not and are unempowered. We should
help them by bringing such acts because these are the social safety nets for
the poor which can help them. And moreover, it's not our dole or charity to
them, it's their right to work so that they can earn enough and get the
basic necessities of their life. It's their basic human right, as per the
Universal Declaration of Human rights, stated in the UN charter, to which we
are a signatory as a nation-state.

Mind you, MGREGA has disadvantages. It can only help those who can provide
labor. The disabled can't work, and MGREGA can't help them. Similarly, Rs.
100 may be too low as a wage at a time of high inflation when PDS doesn't
work well in villages for food distribution and the market has not reached
the villages. But the solution is not dismantling NREGA. It is in expansion
and orienting it with transparency measures to ensure it works,.

Otherwise, governments and police machinery in India doesn't work by and
large..And that way Bipin ji, we should remove all government and police
machinery in India so that we can stop wasting of public funds and remove
all corruption from society.

Rakesh