NREGA Article by Aruna Roy & Nikhil Dey (Peace Mumbai)
Lysa John
==============================================================================
TOPIC: Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey Survey and Explore NREGA
http://groups.google.co.in/group/peace-mumbai/t/60a214815be82a4d?hl=en
==============================================================================
== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Sun, Jun 21 2009 9:58 pm
From: Sukla Sen
http://www.hinduonnet.com/mag/2009/06/21/stories/2009062150010100.htm
*NREGA: Breaking new ground*
ARUNA ROY AND NIKHIL DEY
The NREGA, the flagship programme of the UPA government, was revolutionary
in its promise of inclusive growth, the right to work and the dignity of
labour and a rational, participatory relationship with the State. And it has
mostly delivered...
Suddenly the NREGA has become a buzz word. It stands vindicated by the
mandate of the people in its most basic evaluation in a democracy -- the
general elections. Basking in the glory and security of post-electoral
analysis, it is actually the b est time for those who support the basic
philosophy of the NREGA to focus on what it has done and what it has not, by
its own parameters.
The first and the primary focus should be to examine its impact on the human
resource base of rural India. Has it energised, mobilised, empowered, and
delivered to India's poorest and most marginalised rural people? Secondly,
has it provided those who were "not shining" a measure of dignity, tangible
economic benefit, and a motivation to participate in local action? This is
the crux, for, something as vast and ambitious as the NREGA can only succeed
in bringing about change if millions of workers become its true advocates
and monitors.
Let us begin with the most persistent charges of endemic corruption.
Notwithstanding negative propaganda and the prominent reportage of
corruption, NREGA stands apart from employment and poverty alleviation
programmes in significant ways. It is the first national programme of
consequence which has woven transparency and accountability into the mundane
fabric of daily interaction of people with government. The cases of reported
corruption have shocked the intelligentsia. The rural worker might often be
the victim but will still offer critical support, not only because it has
provided wage income, but also for facilitating disclosure, which helps
identify and fight pilferage. In fact, in many cases, scams have been
exposed by the workers themselves. NREGA gives an opportunity to break the
feudally enforced silence of its victims. Through transparency and social
audit measures, it allows anyone, anywhere to be part of the monitoring of
the delivery system. The other programmes appear to be clean only because no
one knows what goes on! The NREGA gives a further opportunity to realise the
Constitutional sovereignty, the power of the people. What the political
establishment would do well to understand is that the vote was not a blind
endorsement, but the expression of a fragile hope of a rational
participatory relationship with the government.
New claims
The NREGA has opened up a unique legal space for the poor, with a
consequent, legally-mandated obligation on the administration to deliver. In
fact, implementation rests on the simple philosophy that ordinary people
will go to great lengths to procure their entitlements, given the space to
do so. Apart from systemic corruption, we are all aware of the chronic
inefficiency, unwillingness and incapacities of the bureaucratic system to
deliver entitlements for the poor. The persistent argument was that in this
context implementation would be impossible. The NREGA sought to create real
opportunities and legal spaces, with the belief that people will begin to
push to overcome bureaucratic and political resistance. The electoral
endorsement over, it is a good time to begin to examine this aspect of
bottom-up implementation. Does the rights-based approach really work?
The Act has a number of "trigger mechanisms" designed to activate and
establish people's entitlements. One such trigger is the right to have a Job
Card. The Act mandates that anyone who applies at their Panchayat for a Job
Card must be given one within 15 days. Without a Job Card, people cannot
even apply for work, nor corroborate the records. It is a "license" and "pan
card" of the wage worker's family, with a record of days of work and wages
received during the year. There are many States where large numbers of
people have demanded, but not received, Job Cards. In many Panchayats, the
Job Cards are in the control of implementing agencies. Publicising the Job
Card as a record of individual entitlements, to be updated by the
authorities, and kept in possession of the workers, would ensure the NREGA
is monitored by its workers.
Crucial accountability
The application for work and the dated receipt are crucial to trigger the
demand for work. The receipt is also the basic record for claiming
unemployment allowance if the work is not provided within 15 days. States
like Rajasthan have fared well in providing Job Cards, and providing work
within 15 days, but resistance to giving dated receipts has become a massive
problem. No State has effectively activated this important mechanism.
Nevertheless, it has worked when workers groups have got organised.
In the 30 years of existence of its precursor, the Maharashtra Employment
Guarantee Act, there is no recorded instance of payment of unemployment
allowance. The NREGA has already recorded payment of unemployment allowance
to large numbers of workers in chronically poorly-administered areas. The
successful people's struggles for the payment of unemployment allowance -- in
Barwani District of Madhya Pradesh, Raichur of Karnataka, Bolangir,
Navrangpur and Kalahandi of Orissa, Latehar in Jharkhand, Sitapur District
of UP -- has been a breakthrough in accountability, and an inspiration to
other workers struggling for entitlements. The payment of unemployment
allowance emanates from an administrative lapse, and is eventually deducted
from the pocket of erring officials. It is not a freebie doled out of the
government exchequer. Like the Right to Information Act, this has created an
important mechanism for enforcing the right while holding the bureaucracy
accountable.
The wage under NREGA has been another trigger and indicator of its success.
The wage rate, the measurement system, and the timely payment of wages have
all become part of the entitlement package. Thanks to NREGA, minimum wages
have, for the first time, become a real factor in determining the lower
limit for market wages. There are many ongoing struggles for the payment of
minimum wages; and adopting a transparent measurement system for every
work-site is a management challenge that has thrown up many grassroots
solutions.
Bottlenecks
Wage payments through NREGA have initiated the biggest "financial inclusion"
drive, with the requirement that all wage payments be made through banks and
post offices. The engineers, the accountants, and the post offices have been
unable to cope, and late payments have begun to cripple the Act. Students
and Academics, working together with workers' organisations in Khunti
District in Jharkhand, have operationalised the entitlement in the NREGA to
get Rs. 2,000/- per worker paid to over 300 workers as compensation for
delayed payment under the provisions of the Payment of Wages Act. The Khunti
payment, made last month, has once again demonstrated that the solution to
the vexatious issue of late payments lies in the entitlement framework.
The uneven implementation in different States has shown that where people's
struggles have gained political and administrative respect, the NREGA has
shown tangible results on a massive scale. It is that battleground of
struggle that could well determine the future of the political discourse in
this country.
The Government of India has transferred adequate money to the States and
Districts to make timely wage payments. Shri C.P. Joshi, the current Union
Minister for Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, was reported to have
talked about his party prospects in the polls being negatively affected
because of late wage payments in Rajasthan. As Union Minister now, if he
were to exercise his administrative and political will to ensure
compensation is paid to those receiving delayed wage payments, the lethargic
bureaucratic system will find a way to respond. Chronic delays in wage
payments during the drought in Rajasthan became a political issue, and the
delays were wiped out. Innovations and mechanisms respond to a bottom-up
demand, but do so best when the political establishment puts pressure.
The NREGA also assures an adequate, realistic provision for administrative
expenses. At the current six per cent of total costs which has been allowed
for administrative costs, there is no legitimacy in citing a shortage of
staff or resources for bureaucratic delay. In Rajasthan, for instance, the
over 7,000 crores spent on NREGA last year amounts to a massive Rs. 450
crores available for administrative expenses per year. This kind of money
and resources can, in fact, help gram Panchayats become properly resourced
to better carry out their overall responsibilities. It can also help ensure
that there is no excuse for the failure to carry out all transparency
measures and put an effective grievance redressal mechanism in place.
Biggest contribution
Transparency and accountability to the poorest and the weakest is in fact
the biggest potential contribution of the NREGA to the entire governance
system. The NREGA is an outstanding example of how the RTI Act can be woven
into the fabric of the delivery system and the whole legal and governance
paradigm. The entire expenditure on works and workers -- 94 per cent of the
total amount -- is required to be put on the website of the NREGA, with every
transaction revealed in detail. This can easily be increased to 100 per
cent. Using this Management Information System (MIS), Vijaypura Gram
Panchayat in Rajsamand District has begun to build a Janata Information
System (JIS) painted on the walls of government buildings in the Gram
Panchayat. The boards reveal the details of the number of days of work
provided and payments made in the year to every Job Card holder in the
Panchayat. Also painted on the walls are the list of works sanctioned, the
expenditure on labour and material, and item-wise expenditure on material in
each work in the Panchayat, including exactly how many bags of cement, sand
and trolleys of stone were procured, and at what rate in the Gram Panchayat.
This is like a web wall which reveals to every interested visitor all that
they want to examine.
What can be done in one Panchayat can be carried out in the 9,189 Panchayats
of Rajasthan, and the hundreds of thousands of Panchayats in India. The
walls in Vijaypura Panchayat provide details of 976 families given
employment in 2008-09, where two thirds have completed 100 days, with an
expenditure of 91 lakhs. The Sarpanch is a Dalit youth from a poor family,
elected in a general seat, and the Panchayat is proof of how well an
Employment Guarantee programme can be implemented, in terms of people's
entitlements, transparency measures, worksite management, and many other
innovations.
Larger impact
If the millions of financial transactions of the NREGA can go on their web
site, there can be no justification for not following the example and
putting almost every financial transaction of government -- receipt or
expenditure -- on the web sites of the relevant department or agency.
Proactive disclosure is a requirement of the RTI Act, and is a good example
of the larger potential impact of the NREGA on governance.
The NREGA is India's first law to codify development rights in a legal
framework, and like the RTI, it has begun to set an example in a global
context. Apart from the law, and a set of guidelines, there is a strong and
immediate need to formulate rules to operationalise provisions in the Act;
which includes guaranteeing grievance redressal in seven days, social audit
twice a year, and mandatory transparency and proactive disclosure. Properly
incorporated and enforced, a comprehensive set of operational rules could
strengthen the entitlement framework, fixing responsibility at every level.
Once again, it would enable bottom-up pressure for implementation, which
should be matched by a strong political mandate. Today, the NREGA has
millions of workers' unresolved and un-addressed grievances and problems to
be dealt with. A response system could not only radically improve the NREGA,
but can impact and transform the whole face of rural governance.
Is the NREGA an administrator's nightmare or a redistribution of income and
power? A social safety net or a step towards the right to work, to prevent
migration, and even boost local market economies? For those who cannot think
beyond the pale of the free market economy and the business model manager,
it is indeed a nightmare. For years, simplistic management solutions to
poverty, with the poor as an input to be managed, have failed. We cannot see
ordinary people as active participants and empowered citizens. That is why
there is difficulty in understanding the practice and logic of democracy and
difficult, therefore, to understand the realistic detailing and complexity
of an Employment Guarantee initiative.
Inclusive growth
Independent India has to acknowledge the critical role the NREGA has played
in providing a measure of inclusive growth. It has given people a right to
work, to re-establish the dignity of labour, to ensure people's economic and
democratic rights and entitlements, to create labour intensive
infrastructure and assets, and to build the human resource base of our
country. For the first time, the power elite recognises the people's right
to fight endemic hunger and poverty with dignity, accepting that their
labour will be the foundation for infrastructure and economic growth. The
entitlements paradigm is still to be established in many States in the
country. Second generation issues like the expansion of the categories of
permissible works needs to be taken up with labour and the deprived
continuing to be the central focus. The improvements must be to strengthen,
not divert from these basic tenets. In the midst of the current economic
slowdown, there is enough evidence that this kind of commitment can work to
help reduce the slowdown.
The political class would do well to understand that the most important
solution is an assertion of its will to respond to people's voices. The many
wise, creative, and innovative initiatives emerging from theory and practice
have a future only if they are owned by the people and implemented with
justice. The NREGA can give people an opportunity to make the entire system
truly transparent and accountable. Properly supported, people's struggles
for basic entitlements can, in turn, become the strongest political
initiative to strengthen our democratic fabric.
*Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey are activists with the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti
Sangathan (MKSS). Email: arun...@gmail.com, nikh...@gmail.com.*
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Wada Na Todo Abhiyan
C-1/E, 2nd Floor, Green Park Extension
New Delhi 110 001 INDIA
Tel: 91-11-46082371 to 74; Fax: 46082372