National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)

2005

An Act to provide for the

enhancement of livelihood
security of the households
in rural areas of the country
by providing at least one
hundred days of guaranteed
wage employment in every
financial year to every
household whose adult
members volunteer to do
unskilled manual work

Strengthening the Right to Information

Proactive Disclosure under RTI- Problems & Perspectives
 Presentation Structure

NREGA Status
Proactive Disclosure, Social Audits,
Complaints and Grievance Redressal
New Initiatives
Future direction and new initiatives
Good Practices
 NREGA Objectives

Primary
Supplement employment opportunities

Auxiliary
Regenerate natural resource base for sustainable
rural livelihoods
o Water conservation & water harvesting
o Drought Proofing (afforestation & tree plantation)
o Irrigation canals, micro & minor irrigation works
o Works individual land of SC/ST/BPL/IAY/ Land
reform beneficiaries/ Small & Marginal farmers
o Renovation of traditional water bodies
o Land development
o Flood control & protection, drainage
o Rural connectivity

Process Outcomes
Strengthen grass root processes of democracy
 Infuse transparency and accountability
in governance 3
 NREGA National
(FY 2006-07)
Overview
(FY 2007-08) (FY 2008-09) (FY 2009-10)
200 Districts 330 Districts 615 Districts upto August, 09
619 Districts
Employment provided to households:   2.10 Crore 3.39 Crore 4.49 Crore 3.04 Crore
PERSONDAYS [in Crore]
Total:   90.5 143.59 216.01 118.54
SCs:  22.95 [25%] 39.36 [27%] 63.39 [29%] 35.60 [30%]
STs:   32.98 [36%] 42.07 [29%] 54.78 [25%] 26.21 [22%]
Women:  36.79 [41%] 61.15 [43%] 103.41 [48%] 60.62 [51%]
Others:  34.56 [38%] 62.16 [43%] 97.84 [45%] 56.73 [48%]
Average personday per household 43 Days 42 Days 48 Days 39 Days
FINANCIAL DETAIL
Budget Outlay (In Rs Crore): 11300 12000 30000 39100
Central Release (In Rs Crore): 8640.85 12610.39 29939.60 15219.14
Total available fund [including OB]: In Rs. Crore. 12073.55 19,305.81 37483.94 26831.21
Expenditure (In Rs. Crore.) 8823.35 15856.89 27137.88 14398.64
Average wage per day Rs. 65 Rs. 75 Rs. 84 Rs. 88
WORKS DETAIL
Total works taken up (In Lakhs):   8.35 17.88 27.2 23.37
Works completed:    3.87 8.22 12.09 5.28
Water conservation: 4.51 [54%] 8.73 [49 %] 12.50 [46%] 11.60 [49%]
Provision of Irrigation facility to land owned by 0.81 [10%] 2.63 [15 %] 5.56 [20%] 4.34 [19%]
SC/ST/ BPL and IAY benificiaries:
Rural Connectivity: 1.80 [21%] 3.08 [17 %] 4.91 [18%] 3.98 [17%]
Land Development: 0.89 [11%] 2.88 [16%] 3.97 [15%] 3.23 [14%]
Any other activity: 0.34 [4%] 0.56 [3%] 0.25 [1 %] 0.22 [1%]
NREG Act: Pro-active Disclosure
Citizen Information Board
NREGA Information on Wall of Gram Panchayat
Muster Rolls at NREGA Worksite
 MIS for Transparency & Accountability
Management Information System (MIS)
To bring transparency in the whole system
Provide single window interface for all the stake holders of
NREGA
Track transfer of funds to various implementing agency
(sanction order, financial releases)
Prepare inventory of works/assets created under NREGA for
future planning.
Register grievances of workers.
Details of works and workers

Separate pages for approximately 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats,

6465 Blocks, 619 Districts and 34 States & UTs.
 Job Cards & Muster Rolls in Public Domain (http://nrega.nic.in)

S NO. Upto Number of Job Number of Muster

Month Cards Rolls
(Since inception) (Since inception)
1 JUN, 08 3.0 Crores 0.44 Crores
2 SEP, 08 4.9 Crores 0.78 Crores
3 DEC, 08 5.7 Crores 1.06 Crores
4 MAR, 09 6.0 Crores 1.18 Crores
5 MAY, 09 6.9 Crores 1.60 Crores
6 Mid SEP, 09 8.0 Crores 2.10 Crores

 Daily 40-50 thousand Muster Rolls are uploaded on the website by the States.
 Social Audits

Amendments in the Act to provide procedure for social audits

• Social audits to be conducted once in six months
• Prior planning and announcement of audit
• DPC & PO responsible for audit (planning & availability of
documents)
• Formation of Social Audit Committee (workers & 1/3 women)
• Documents made available 15 days prior to SAC for verification
• Public representatives and concerned officials to attend
• SAC to read out findings.
• Minutes recorded
Women at a Social Audit in Rajasthan
 Grievance Redressal Mechanism
Grievance
Redressal
Mechanism

Complaints

Penalty
Provision

•Amendment to the Act was made to provide procedure for effective redressal of
complaints and enforcing Section 25
 Helplines & Grievance Redressal Rules

•Helplines for receipt of complaints & forwarding to state/districts

-Set up at Ministry
-States- A.P, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, H.P, J&K, Jharkhand, Karnataka,
Kerala, Orissa, Sikkim, U.P, Uttarakhand , W.B, Goa

•Grievance Redressal Rules

Formulated by Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, H.P, J&K, Jharkhand, Karnataka,
Nagaland, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tripura, Uttarakhand

14
 Financial Inclusion
Amendment to sub-section I of Section 29 (Feb 2009)

7.75 crore NREGA bank and post office accounts have been opened
-Separation of monitoring agency from payment agency
-Encourages saving habits
-Money directly in the hand of workers
-Individual accounts in the name of women

Payment through Business Correspondent Models using latest

ICT technologies Smart Card & bio-metrics, ATMs
(Information & Communication Technology)
Challenges
-Poor coverage of bank and post office accounts
-Delay in payments
 Performance Feedback Sources

Statutory Mechanisms
•CAG (Audit of 68 districts in 128 blocks and 513 GPs) 2006-07
•Central Employment Guarantee Council
Internal Mechanisms
•MPRs & MIS
•Performance Review Meetings
•Area Officers for field verifications
•State, district, block level inspections
•Helplines, Complaints

External & Independent Mechanisms

National Level Monitors
• Studies commissioned in 2006-07 (5 studies, 28 districts, 11 states)
• 2007-08 (6 studies, 33 districts, 11 states)
•Professional Institutional Network (18 institutions, 18 states, 60 districts)
 Major Challenges
•Lack of adequate technical and administrative manpower at
block and GP levels (full time dedicated Programme Officers,
administrative and technical assistants)
•Lack of Awareness
•Non-maintenance of records like job cards, dated receipts,
employment registers, measurement books, asset registers,
Muster Rolls
•Non conduct of social audits
•Lack of adequate monitoring mechanisms
•Incorrect/non-standardized reporting of physical and financial
achievements
•Instances of rent seeking and misuse of authority (inflated
estimates, bogus muster rolls, fund diversion)
 President’s Address to Parliament – 4 June 2009

… increasing transparency and public accountability of

NREGA by enforcing social audit and ensuring
grievance redressal by setting up district level
ombudsman.

...To ensure transparency and public accountability,

independent monitoring and grievance redressal
mechanisms will be set up at the district level …
 New Initiatives
Social Audits
•Issue of instructions to the State Governments for enforcement of the
new social audit provisions under NREGA
• Organization of meeting of District Programme Coordinators at the
State level for drawing up action plan for social audit
•Social Audit Calendar and monitoring of audits online
-Details of action taken uploaded
-Follow up action can be tracked down to the Gram Panchayat level
• Thirty seven National Level Monitor were deputed to 37 districts in 15
states for special monitoring of the social audit campaign initiated by the
Ministry.
•Currently 89% of the Gram Panchayats are being covered under social
audits
 Ombudsman
Instructions under Section 27 issued on establishment of district
level Ombudsman to States (within 3 months of September 7, 2009)

1 Appointment •State Government to appoint Ombudsman based on the

recommendations of Selection Committee.
•Selection Committee will consist of Chief Secretary of State ,
Representative of Union Ministry of Rural Development,
eminent Civil Society person nominated by Ministry of Rural
Development and Secretary of Department in State
Government dealing with NREGA as Member-Covenor
2 Qualification •Persons with 20 years of experience in Public Administration
•Should not be more than 65 years
•No member of political party will be eligible
•He should be physically active
•Prior publication of panel should be done in the official website
of the State for receiving comments within 30 days
•Selection Committee should dispose of objections within 30
days
•Anonymous comments and objections should not be
considered
3 Tenure & Removal •Tenure will be 2 years
•Tenure can be extended by one year based on performance or
up to 65 years of age
•No reappointment
•State Government can remove if unsatisfactory performance
and recommendation of Selection Committee
4 Autonomy •Ombudsman will be independent of State and Central
Government

5 Remuneration •A compensation of Rs.500/-Per sitting

6 Location of Office •District Headquarters

•One or more Ombudsman in each District
7 Office Support •DRDA (Distributed Relational Database Architecture) to provide
Technical and Administrative support or any other body
specified by the State Government
8 Appraisal •Selection Committee to appraise the performance regularly
every year
9 Powers •Lodge FIRs against the erring parties
•Direct redressal, disciplinary actions
•Inititate proceedings in the event of any circumstances that
may cause any grievance
10 Disposal of •Ombudsman will issue notice to NREGA authority for appearance
Complaints •Case will be disposed by passing appropriate direction once the facts are
admitted
•Award should be based on evidence and incompliance with NREG Act,
instructions issued by State or Central Government
•Copy of award will be to parties
•Costs may be imposed in case of false, malicious and complaints
•NREGA authority will comply with award within one month or pay penalty
at Rs.50 per day of delay
•The Penalty should not exceed the amount stipulated as fine in Section 25
of NREG Act
•Monthly report should be sent to Chief Secretary and Secretary in charge
of NREGA
•In case of Corruption the Ombudsman will forward the matter to take up
criminal prosecution
•A representative of Programme Officer/ District Programme Coordinator
may appear in cases where they are party
•Programme Officer/ District Programme Coordinator shall appear only
when a proceeding is taken up
•All cases that do not involve complicated questions of fact or law should
be disposed within 15 days
•Other cases may be disposed within 45 days
11 Appeal •There shall be no appeal against the award of Ombudsman
•The award of Ombudsman shall be final
 NREGA with UIDA

NREGA partnership with Unique

Identification Development Authority of
India (UIDA) has been initiated. The
database of NREGA will be utilized by the
UID Authority to expedite the development
of the identification system for the
residents.