Why MG National Rural Employment Guarantee Act is not the best thing to do?
The MGNREGA is the largest initiatives of its kind in the world, It was the flagship program of UPA1, and gave a lot to cheer back then, But as time passed by, the economic crisis of the decade gave a terrible shock to the world economy , even though effect on India’s economy was minimal compared to many western capitalist nations , the inflation rate soared up , the nation was on its way to that “heavy growth period” And actually who pays for that? It is the low income Indian.
राष्ट्रीय पुनर्गठन परियोजना
The MGNREGA is the largest initiatives of its kind in the world, It was the flagship program of UPA1, and gave a lot to cheer back then, But as time passed by, the economic crisis of the decade gave a terrible shock to the world economy , even though effect on India’s economy was minimal compared to many western capitalist nations , the inflation rate soared up , the nation was on its way to that “heavy growth period” And actually who pays for that? It is the low income Indian.
Economic crisis did have an impact on the Indian economy, But as we dig deep we can find that the inflation is caused not only by the impact of world economy, but also as a result of the heavy growth and many steps taken by the government to overcome these, like stimulus packages and variations bought in CRR, SLR and interest rates
The government pumps in a whooping 40 thousand + crore Rs into the society a year which naturally gives an increase in the disposable income, hence a growth in the inflation as well. The notable fact is that the tax-GDP ratio has actually been falling and the program could end up costing 5% of GDP.
Further concerns include increasing corruptions by the state government. It has been found out that more people have job cards than actual people on field. Asking and receiving Bribes have also been reported, There have been cases where as high as Rs 50 are asked for a job card.
The NREGA also fails to bring in substantial amount of
development into the society to ensure efficient and effective development .The
options are almost none for the government as most of the low income people are
non skilled, forcing the government to employ them in low skilled or non
skilled works like plucking of weeds and cleaning of water bodies, which also
ensured that the cycle goes on and on, promising employment all the time. But
sustainable development is a question left out.
“A multi-crore fraud has also been suspected where many
people has been issued the NREGA card who is either employed with another
Government Job and who are not even aware that they have a Job Card. In
Gujarat, a scam of Rs 10 million has taken place. The productivity of laborers
involved under NREGA is considered to be lower because of the fact that
laborers consider it as a better alternative to working under major projects.
There is criticism from construction companies that NREGA has affected the
availability of labor as laborers prefer to working under NREGA to working
under construction projects.” – A major online news portal.
The NRP. How could it place India one step ahead in the game?
NRP stands for national restructuring program.
The national restructuring program is expected to be an efficient as well as effective program, for guaranteeing sustainable development in the much diverse Indian economy. It is formulated so as to decrease the government spending and promote sustainable development.
NRP is formulated with a target of long term gain for a greater population than a short term gain for a smaller part of the society, also the changing status of Indian economic system is taken into consideration.
NRP is not a substitute for the NREGA in the societal view, but theoretically saying NRP can replace NREGA in the long run. But the chances are almost ‘0’. NRP can facilitate in a building of a better and stable economy through NREGA. Hence a hand in hand method is preferred.
NRP is designed to ensure transparency in procedures, effectiveness of the work done and efficiency of the society in creating a sustainable economy. NRP creates no direct revenue for the government; but it contributes to the GDP as the savings and investment rates go up.
Every district in India varies in terms development, level of education, basic infrastructure and male female ratio. Hence the concept of NRP cannot be implemented in one stage.
It will only be logical to slowly dissolve the NRP into our society without discouraging the NREGA. NRP works best with NREGA for an unemployed person. NREGA through NRP is different from the normal NREGA the main difference being shift of NREGA from welfare to workfare.
Working of NRP.
Every institution/corporate/firm/organization/ or any kind of body that employs people gives a detailed application for employees which mentions expected qualification, experience etc..This is scanned and details of unemployed individuals whose details match with specifications are then forwarded to the employer.
All of these are accomplished through a powerful integrated network connected to each and every district of the country, this database store the information of each and every people listed as well as employers. Hence NRP can only reach its full potential with Unique Identification Project.
People irrespective of their qualifications and employers irrespective of their size can list themselves into this massive NRP network.
The difference of NREGA through NRP is that if there is no productive work to employ, or works that are directly connected to poverty like flood removal or disaster assistance, people are given the unemployment allowance that is 1/2nd of the wage, which will be paid by the state government.
NRP Administration.
The NRP works with the collectorate as its regional office ,NRP works on a district based level so that , expenses are lesser compared to a panchayath based model meanwhile it is more efficient and closer to people than a state level approach.
Role of the district office is also that of a monitoring body , that is the office makes sure that all works done through the NRP is contributing to the national GDP, and no work is left unproductive, it also monitors labor relations of the firm is kept as per the standards.
Collector is the regional head, so as to reduce the political influences in operations.
A central body is made and maintained by the Government of India which has members representing each and every state; the head is appointed by the central Government.
The restructuring role of the NRP.
Most of India’s population is found to be illiterate, that is 80% of the population in 18-22 age group are illiterate and literacy most often doesn’t do any help as 90% of the employers in India require people with vocational skills and 90%of countries collage and school education has nothing to do with technical skills its only about bookish knowledge
Recent statistics say that in the age group of 15-60 only 0.3%has technical education, considering these factors and taking into account our 1.2 billion +population, it is mandatory that making them fit for the future would do the job for India. But a price needs to be paid. The estimated cost for the structural repair of India’s educational system and providing technical education is found out to be 490,000 crore rupees, which is 10% of India’s GDP.
The amount (490,000 crore) could be found out by implementing NRP, as there is a revenue for the government from the project, not only by cashing on the potential developments of the country with more disposable incomes with the employee as well as employer (more savings and investments) also by getting rid of huge NREGA spending a year.NRP may not be able to find this sum in a short period but it sure will in a long term perspective.
The spending on educational restructuring, if the estimations are correct would yield out a 17, 51,487 crore for the country which is 61% of the nations GDP.
But as in present case it is obvious that 92%-93% of the total applications for the NRP listings by the people would be for non-skilled, illiterate jobs. And there should be naturally some factor that enables us to create new or existing employers that would motivate them to employ these people. This could be
· Tax exemptions.
Giving a different bracket preference to employers employing these people –with X% of total employees being in lower end of the society, X varies with demography, size and manner of job done (With terms and conditions).
NRP in an entrepreneurial view
NRP is also formulated with a purpose of promulgating an entrepreneurial tendency all over India, especially among the women. People should register themselves as self employed for this .The people who register themselves as “NRP self employed” are listing themselves as employed. Hence on receiving their application the regional office creates a request (if found satisfactory) to the government for the business behalf of the applicants. These businesses are created by a group or an individual. The government gives them loan and initial support.
They can even employ themselves in projects like Shakhty amma an initiative of ITC that is currently creating tens of thousands of entrepreneurs among women, even in the deepest rural areas of India. It has been a great success. Hence if implemented and executed in the right way with the monitoring done transparently there is no way Entrepreneurial NRP can turn out to be a disappointment .
Benefits of NRP
ü To make sure that minimum wages as per state govt is kept
ü To increase disposable income in a healthy way
ü To make rural India better for investments as well as living
ü To increase self sufficiency
ü To increase the Govt revenue
ü To decrease the Govt spending on NREGA
ü To improve employment rates
ü To increase standard of living in both urban and rural India
ü To enhance the complete image of the nation
ü To improve domestic production and consumption
ü To pull out people from BPL (subsequently)
ü To improve the labor standards as regional offices also has a monitoring function
ü To bring in transparency to employment and related activities.
