Year: 2018 | Month: September | Volume 63 | Issue 3
A Geographical Study of the Ground Realities of Rural Safety Net in India: A village level study of MGNREGS
Sarmistha Saha
DOI:10.30954/0424-2513.3.2018.26
Abstract:
Rural safety nets are indispensable ingredients of boosting economy of a developing country like India. Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is one of the most discussed safety net of the vast Indian subcontinent. NREGA act was passed by Union Government in 2005 which was later renamed as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) in year 2009. This Act results for the initiation of MGNREGS which came into existence on February 2, 2006. It was implemented in a phase wise manner. At first stage, 200 most backward districts of the country were covered, phase II included 130 additional districts and the final phase covered the remaining rural districts of the country. The spread and provisions of MGNREGS has made the scheme a pillar of Indian rural development. This is the landmark scheme of Indian Government which provides employment to the job seekers with a right based approach. Though the initial aim of this scheme was to provide employment to the unemployed rural youth, a strategy of sustainable livelihood is hidden under the policy. Much highlight has been given to the employment generation aspect of the scheme, as this was the prime focus of the Act. Financial year 2015-2016 accounts for the generation of 286497320 employment days in West Bengal in total with 9157780 MGNREGS workers. The aspect of generation of common property resources through MGNREGS is not much discussed and evaluated by the researchers. The quality and sustainability of rural Common Property Resources (CPRs) is significant for generating sustainable rural livelihood. This paper provides an attempt to see the realities of MGNREGS generated CPRs on an empirical basis. The gap of theoretical overview and real implementation is evaluated in this paper with empirical observation.
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