Here is an example of my work, an article that appeared in Terra Green, a journal of TERRI, India's leading non-profit org, headed by R.K. Pachauri, a Nobel Prize winner.
Jobs for whom?
The truth about the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act
More than 200 men, women, and children had gathered in Pithanpur village to narrate tell the work they did under the NREGA (National Rural Employment Guarantee Act), guaranteeing 100 days of employment in a year to unskilled labourers. This was a jan sunwai, or public hearing that empowers the villagers to check on erring officials and peoples’ representatives, was conducted by an NGO, SSS (Samvad Samajik Sanathan), based in the Pratapgarh district of Uttar Pradesh. ‘Public hearing is the first step towards empowering people so that they can ask questions about the development scheme and demand answers,’ says Rambadan Shulka of SSS. In a social audit, the government supports the programme, gives the document to an agency. and promises follow-up action. In a jan sunwai the government is not voluntarily involved.
These people had gathered to confirm if the work details entered in their job cards and muster rolls were correct. Many find higher number of days, therefore higher amount of wages paid, entered in these documents, meaning that the extra amount had been swindled by officials in connivance with the head of the village panchayat, the lowest tier of governance. At the jan sunwai, a villager read out names of every labourer who had worked for the programme and every worker climbed on to the dais and confirmed the details.
They demanded explanations for every wrongdoing. ‘I worked only for 19 days for a khadanja (brick laden bridal path), how come the muster roll says that I was paid for 32 days,’ asks 48-year-old Murat Devi. Others were also equally vocal. ‘The panchayat secretary has to give me the extra amount of Rs 1160 that he usurped,’ demanded Shyam Sunder, another villager. This was the amount paid for 20 days of extra work shown in the muster roll and the wage of Rs 58 a day in March 2007 when the work was done in the village.
The people felt more confident because of the presence of Jean Dreze, prominent economist and a main force behind the passage of the Act. Also present were a dozen young students who were in the village to witness the event and understand social reality in rural India. It forced the entire district bureaucracy to attend as a group.
Dreze had some practical suggestions. ‘Wage details should be indicated in job cards to keep a check on corruption and key features of the Act and names and contacts of officials responsible for implementing the Act should be mentioned on the back,’ he said. The district administration took a note of these suggestions and promised to pursue them with the state government.
After evaluating the overall scenario in these 6 districts, it was clear that providing 100 days of manual labour was a distant dream. Even though the government considers villagers fit for only manual work, even this is not available to them. Usually, labourers got to work for two weeks
only which included less that 20% women in a research sample of over a thousand persons.
Then, although, the Act provides jobs for persons with special abilities, not a single person emerged from our sample of 1036 labourers from six districts.
The government should take note of the actual situation on the ground if it envisages the NREGA as a tool to fight poverty and provide jobs to millions of hungry Indians. And, the time is now as the Act, currently effective in 300 districts, will soon be implemented across the country.
I've been writing articles on ecology, environment & grassroots development and reports on these issues for Indian magazines and newspapers for the last 18 years.